


In the Body

by WareWolf



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Alternate Season/Series 10, Alternate Season/Series 10 Finale, Alternate Season/Series 11, Bobby is back from Heaven, Crobby - Freeform, Dean Winchester Bears the Mark of Cain, If Crowley had had Bobby instead of Rowena with him?, M/M, My Take on The Darkness, Post-Demon Dean
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-04-26
Updated: 2015-09-26
Packaged: 2018-03-25 20:52:05
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 16
Words: 44,684
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3824674
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/WareWolf/pseuds/WareWolf
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>This story is a sequel to Your Mission If You Choose to Accept It.  Castiel has orchestrated Bobby Singer's return from Heaven, seeing him as the only being who can keep Crowley, the King of Hell, on course.  Now, can even Bobby help when the boys have loosed a new apocalypse, in the form of the Darkness, upon the world?</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

Bobby Singer had just woken up in his new house for the first time since getting the all-clear from Castiel that the angels were no longer hunting him down.  Good to know.  He yawned and stretched, aware that the warm presence behind him was also awake, having received an elbow in the ribs.  He grinned to himself as that rough, precisely-accented British voice spoke in his ear.  "Thank you, Robert, I'm paying attention now."

 _When aren't you?_   Bobby thought, but he'd learned that you didn't give verbal ammunition to the King of Hell.  He also wondered when he would wake up and not feel this ...surprise as he remembered all over again that he had fallen in love not only with a man, but a demon.  He hoped never, because that would mean he had begun to take Crowley for granted and he didn't want that.  So he only yawned again and turned about in bed to regard the other man, whose face was now close to his own, the dark amber eyes focused on his.  Crowley's dark hair was usually immaculate, but he was as subject to bedhead as anyone else.

Bobby reached a hand to Crowley's bare shoulder, touching him over the bright lines of his dragon tattoo.  "Home at last.  Feels like the first time, you know.  Didn't get to settle down at all before the angel boys showed up."

"Not what I call a housewarming,"  Crowley agreed.

"You want a party?"

For a horrifying moment he thought Crowley did, before he saw the grimace.  For himself, Bobby had had to be alone, mostly, ever since he lost Karen in the terrible way he had, the way that had brought him into the supernatural world and ultimately, to this man, this being.  The most social he had ever got was going to a bar with the boys, or out on the road on the rare occasions he'd gone on a job with them.  Of course, that was what had done him in, he thought wryly; the bullet with his name on it had come from a Leviathan.  He'd even wondered whether it was sheer loneliness that had drawn him to Crowley, loneliness and being completely displaced.  Nothing like returning from death to do that for you.

Then Crowley was in his arms, pushing close, his own arms sliding around Bobby's shoulders, his body against him.  He kissed Bobby on the cheek, then angled for his mouth.  No, Bobby thought, as his body reacted to Crowley's closeness, it sure wasn't that, not _only_ that. 

"I want a party of you and me, with some good booze, to celebrate me not having to disappear back to Hell afterwards, once I settle certain problems Below,"  Crowley said, when the kiss was over.

Bobby's fingers trailed along his back muscles.  "Sounds good,"  he murmured.  When they finally left the bed for a shower, it was much later than Bobby usually rose.  There was much to do to get the house in order, he thought with contentment.  On the warding front, they would have to put their heads together and devise a system to warn against any demons other than Crowley approaching, for there lay the greatest threat.  His successor, whoever that might be, would want to tidy up loose ends and now that the angels were no longer hunting Bobby, he was definitely focused on keeping Crowley safe.

He went into the kitchen, hoping there was enough coffee, but what he saw there drove that thought from his mind.  Crowley, investigating the cupboards, turned at the sound of Bobby's approach.  He was wearing black trousers and a black t-shirt with faded silver lettering indicating some sort of heavy metal music.  Bobby gawked, then openly grinned at the sight.  "Thought it would take threats of a holy water bath to get you out of your suit.  You look good.  Hey – you didn't poof off somewhere to get the threads, did you?"

"Think I can't take care of myself now, Singer?"

"I dunno.  You said you were out of juice so maybe somebody needs to watch out for you at the moment."

"That was  before,"  Crowley muttered.  The thought that Bobby had been concerned about him was still a strange one.  Folk had worried that he'd show up, afraid _of_ him, certainly, but no one, none of his many partners over the decades, had cared about his welfare.  He sighed.  "The pants are mine from my suit.  Dean gave me the shirt."

"Dean did?"

"Sam handed it to me but I think you'll observe that the Moose wouldn't be able to wear it?"

Bobby grinned at that thought.  You couldn't pick two more opposite men than the giant Sam Winchester and the dapper Crowley.  He touched Crowley's chest, rubbing lightly.  It felt so damn weird knowing that was okay, seeing Crowley smile at him.  Where the hell were they going with this?  He only knew that he wanted Crowley here, twinned with a heartsick worry.  He shoved it aside, concentrated on the mundane necessities.  Thanks to Sam, he had mundane transport now in the form of a secondhand truck, which even had papers in the name of Bob Hunter, a nom de plume which had made Bobby groan, but it seemed he was stuck with it.

"You may not need to eat, but I gotta go shopping, stock up some, get some other stuff for the house.  Want to ride shotgun?"

Crowley's grin was enough answer. 

He seemed to treat the shopping trip as a new and exciting experience and for all Bobby knew, it was.  The last time Crowley had needed to eat human food; there sure hadn't been any supermarkets around.  He wanted to push the trolley and the hunter had to growl at him to slow down!  He was no longer worried that folk in this new town would label them as a gay couple;  it was more like they would decide Crowley was his brain-damaged relative with whose care he was lumbered.

Getting home was a relief and also the first time he had thought of the house as home.  It wasn't really that yet, but it would get there, Bobby thought.  For the first time in more years than he wanted to count, it would also include Crowley and that thought made a small warm space of happiness in his thoughts.  He turned to look at the demon as he braked in front of the house and had to grin at the sight of him clutching two of the shopping bags to his chest.

"What?"  Crowley asked.

Bobby shook his head, still grinning.  "Just you."

A real "honeymoon" was out of the question, certainly for now, but Bobby was content as he put the groceries and kitchen items away, with Crowley watching as though the task was of supreme importance.  He felt oddly edgy, though, when Crowley was out of his sight.  By the way the demon stayed near him, it was possible he felt the same.  Hard to believe that the angels weren't still gunning for him...weirder yet that he didn't _want_ to go to Heaven.  Crowley, though, the rebel demons he hadn't killed would be looking for him.

"Warding's all done?" he asked.

"Last night,"  Crowley said, quirking a brow.  "You think I would relax here without that?  Soon as you were asleep, love..."

"I should have helped."  Bobby knew the protest was automatic even as he grumbled the words.  The reminder that Crowley really did not need to sleep was just more emphasis of what he was.  He'd stay with Bobby until Bobby fell asleep and then he would leave the bed to do whatever.  Also, he should have known the wards were done, from the moment he had woken and felt that sense of security, of home.  "Falling down in my old age...whatever my damn age is now."

There was a shadow in Crowley's expression now.  Probably the reference to mortality.  How the hell lonely was that, Bobby wondered.  There were people who wanted to live for ever, but when they did die, they found out that Hell was neverending.  You were shoved into a body that wasn't yours and tortured into obedience, to drag others into the same horror.  Of course, nobody made you swear, or sell, but demonic deals weren't wasn't exactly a case of full disclosure.

"Not a chance, darling,"  the demon king said, playful once more.  "Of course, _I_ will be falling down on the job literally if I don't make sure they're mopping up the blood and being good demons."  He looked around regretfully as though committing his surroundings and Bobby to memory.

"You got to go now?"  the hunter asked, then smacked his forehead ruefully.  "Don't listen to me.  Jes' get back soon as you can."

"Walk outside with me,"  Crowley said, his voice soft.  Bobby moved beside him, down the two steps at the front of the house and out into the spacious expanse of grass.  Wasn't much more than grass in the yard and some bushes around the fence but that suited him.  Early afternoon now and the odd car passing, the sight of a neighbour in a yard a few houses along.  Still, quiet enough that Crowley could zap out of sight and nobody notice, because of course you couldn't do that kind of thing.  He put his arm around the demon king almost in defiance and because he simply wanted to feel his solidity, hugged him and released reluctantly.  Crowley simply stood there, frowning.

"Uh, did you try to...?"

"There's nothing."  Crowley abruptly vanished and reappeared a few paces back, shrugging.  "Nothing wrong with my ability, but the door to Hell seems to be jammed closed, love."  He paused again, frustration on his face.  "That's intolerable!"

"You can handle them tryin' to kill you, just not changing the locks on you?"  Bobby asked.

Crowley began to speak and then Bobby felt a small wash of heat from the air around him, as though someone had lit a fire nearby.  The stench of sulphur assaulted his nose, not Crowley, not just one or two....He was surrounded by a ring of demons, all silent, their vessels a crazy mix of people.  Delivery man, a couple of housewives, people in suits and jogger clothes and school uniforms.  All with their eyes flashing black as they regarded him and the demon who was supposed to be their King.

With the knowledge from all his years of hunting, Bobby knew it was useless.  That of course didn't mean he wasn't going to fight like, pardon him, Hell itself.   He removed his arm from around Crowley's shoulders and reached into his pocket for the blade that always lived there.

"No,"  Crowley growled softly.  "Love, take my hand and _hold_ _on_.  Don't let me go, not now, not when we get where we're going."

 _They'll follow,_   Bobby wanted to say, but he reached out blindly behind him and found Crowley's hand, gripping it tightly.  Then there was nothing.  They did not emerge at once, in an eyeblink.  There was just nothing.  He couldn't feel the other's hand or even his own body.  Breathing, then.  Air moving, enclosed by flesh, his flesh.  Awareness behind his closed eyes.  _Well, it worked that time..._ he thought.  Of course it had.  The demons had set a spell for their King, to know when he tried to return to Hell and to identify precisely where he was.  And now Bobby's skin crept with wrongness and dread.

"Open your eyes, love."

He did and stared at his surroundings.  Dark, gothic-cathedral type, with a huge and ornate throne on a dais behind them.  Walls of gray stone, pillars in rows from massive wooden doors at the far end.  There was a pervading odour at once familiar and alien in intensity which he belatedly recognised as sulphur and the iron stink of blood.  The silence held nothing of peace;  it was ominous and heavy, like a lowering thunderstorm.  Bobby Singer was immediately terrified, deeper and more lasting than any fear he had known.  _Hell._

The King of Hell stood at his side and what madness was there that he found comfort in that fact?  Crowley looked at him soberly and transferred Bobby's hand to his shoulder, never losing contact.  "Don't let go of me, Bobby."

"What are you doing?  Why are we _here_?"

"Beating them home,"  Crowley said.  He closed his eyes for a moment in concentration and then opened them.  A heartbeat later, the chamber was abruptly full of beings.  Of demons, the same ones from Bobby's yard and a score of others.  They stood in their ranks before the dais, as he and Crowley ascended the step, he with his hand still clamped on the King's shoulder.  The demons looked startled, some dishevelled and confused and Bobby realised that Crowley had pulled them all here with his will, commanding them to his presence before they even thought to do it themselves and attack him.  He had seen that done with a savage dog and even with men.  Now the gaze of every demon there went to their King...and to the scruffy, bearded hunter standing beside him with his hand on Crowley's shoulder.

"Why'm I doing this?"  Bobby mumbled as loudly as he dared.  He felt that in any moment, one or all of those demons was going to jump him for daring to touch Crowley.

"Because you're a living human, darling, and a desirable, um, commodity to demons.  This enables me to extend my power to shield you."  He wasn't looking at Bobby;  he stared at the crowd, first one and then another, his face more grim and threatening than Bobby had ever seen him.  Their hosts were a cross-section of humanity and of all ages;  Bobby even saw young children standing there, their eyes flashing a variety of colours as they regarded him.

"Nice job, whoever cleaned up in here,"  Crowley said softly to the crowd as a whole.  "Now I want the names of those who _didn't_ come to the surprise party.  The planners.   I want them within the hour.  Pray to me and I will come to you for the information.  Meanwhile, you see this human."  The ravenous stares fixed on Bobby again.  "He is under my protection and not to be harmed.  Any who harms him will experience indefinite torture under my personal supervision.  Get back in line now and I will forgive your little test of me.  It is time some of you realised that we _need_ humans and that some of them are actually useful."  Playing to his audience, Bobby knew, but by god Crowley's tone made him shiver.  "Now get out of here,"  the King of Hell snarled, and the throne chamber was abruptly empty except for the two of them. 

There was a moment of silence and Bobby felt his hand cramp, but he held on to Crowley.  Time later to ask for the whys, but after a moment he did say, "Somethin' we're waiting for?"

"I need to be on site for awhile,"  Crowley said.  "But no reason why we can't go somewhere more comfortable to talk."

It was awkward, to say the least, having to keep his hand on Crowley's shoulder as though he couldn't walk by himself.  Though he had been imprisoned in Hell, these bare gray stone passages were unfamiliar to Bobby.  If he had to guess, he would have said they were in some old European castle, ancient and echoing and freezing, but from what Crowley had said, they were in Hell itself, nowhere on Earth.  Crowley led them straight at a dead-end wall, which blurred to smoke at their approach and reformed as an extremely luxurious apartment, perhaps a penthouse in New York, furnished to resemble the 1920s or thereabouts.

"You can let go now,"  Crowley said and Bobby did, immediately flexing his fingers. "It would still be wise for you not to stray too far from me while we're here."

"No problem,"  Bobby muttered uneasily.  "So all of 'em blocked you from travelling and then homed in on your signal?"

"Something like that,"  Crowley agreed.  "It would have taken a lot of them and my people don't often work together to that extent."

He didn't look bothered, but Bobby knew he was probably thinking furiously about a dozen possibilities at once.  He looked about and spotted a drinks cabinet, done in some beautiful polished golden wood.  Its beauty was of less interest to Bobby than its contents and he shot Crowley an inquiring look before strolling towards it.

"Don't suppose we could have a drink while you work it out?"

"Of course, darling."  Crowley caught up with him and found glasses and a decanter of his beloved Glenncraig. "I'm afraid you won't find any of your favourite rotgut here, so you'll have to make do with this."

Bobby huffed and Crowley smiled at him, only briefly, but it cheered the hunter, who turned to look again at the bed with its lovely silken hangings in red and black and purple.  "So have you brought anyone here before who was, you know, still kickin'?"

"That's a really distressing way to put the question, you know, Robert,"  Crowley said, staring at him.  "Hell-time runs slowly, you know and I have been King for, well, some years."

"That's a yes then?"

"Not since you and I have been, well...."

"You idjit,"  Bobby growled, putting down his glass and closing the distance between them.  "I'm not asking for vows of – of  - you know.  I don't even know what to call what we are.  I was just thinkin' how fancy this place is if only you ever sees it."  He held out his hands to Crowley as though to embrace him, appeared to think better of it and gripped the demon king's shoulders.  "All that time you've been in Hell, bein' a Crossroads demon and then King, but all the time you're alone.  I know what being alone feels like, after my wife – havin' to help her like I did.  Losin' friends as well.  Half the time the boys just called me to pick my brains and then hung up without even askin' how I'm doing.  If there were times you weren't alone, I'm glad, that's all."

Without really planning it, Crowley had moved into his arms so that Bobby could rest his chin against his shoulder, stroking his back.  "No one like you," he said, his gravelly voice slightly muffled.  "Oh, I didn't force any of them.  It doesn't do anything for the ego to think someone's only with you because you pulled rank, though of my people, force usually hasn't been necessary.  They think sharing my bed means I favour them.  But occasionally there was one of my deals where they were, you know, keen to go the extra mile and I actually found them attractive enough."

Bobby spluttered and heard Crowley's answering chuckle.  "Just perks of the job, huh?"

"Exactly so, love."

They moved to a red velvet couch, chosen by Bobby so he wouldn't have to keep looking at it.  Crowley became abstracted and even ignored his drink, though he grasped the glass when Bobby tried to slide it away.  What felt like a long while later, Crowley sighed and was back in the room with him.  He looked at Bobby beside him with an air of faint surprise, as though surprised to find him still there.  "I know you said we were okay in here,"  the hunter said by way of explanation, "but I still don't feel too good poking around this place."  He shivered a little, from memory rather than cold.  "So this is kinda a different.....realm, almost, than where the souls go?"

Crowley nodded.  "You don't travel around Hell by physical trekking.  The barriers are more than doors; only full demons are able to pass through them.  There are dungeons..."

"I know,"  Bobby whispered.  Memories shivered within him, then mercifully retreated.

"And there are cells...and fire...and ice,"  the King of Hell said very quietly.  "You _weren't_ tortured, Robert, by my orders.  The demons who 'played' with you by taking the forms of Sam and Dean didn't consider that torture, but I punished them anyway.  I had hoped you would forgive me, eventually."

"It wasn't the best way to try for that,"  Bobby told him.  He slid an arm around Crowley, who cuddled against him with a sigh.  "So when do we leave?"  He waited with unconcealed anxiety.

"You aren't going to like it."

"I already don't like it.  Spill already."

"If I return to the Earth plane immediately, with you, I will appear weak and perhaps more demons will then join my detractors and..."  Crowley snapped his fingers.  "If I am to convince them I am all the way back, darling, they need to see me.  More than that, they need to see me being the King."

"And that means what?"

"I need to hold court."


	2. Chapter 2

The demon Crowley summoned to his private residence was not at all what Bobby had imagined as a top-ranking demon, but he did look like a butler.  He was tall and rather elegant, with white hair and beard, dressed in sober black.  "Guthrie,"  Crowley said slowly.  "You were most fortunate in being away from Hell at the time of this latest attempt on my life."

"I was most distressed when I heard, my liege."

"I'm sure.  Moreover, I've been unable to find any link between you and the plotters, so you are either innocent or extremely capable, either of which pleases me.  You see me back and unharmed now and able to keep you in a situation I'm sure you prefer to what could be."

"Yes, sire,"  Guthrie said, keeping his gaze on Crowley.

"You see this human."  Crowley gestured at Bobby and Guthrie looked at him, his expression perfectly correct, seeing only what Crowley told him to see.  "He is with me and to be afforded the same protections.  I will hold court at the usual time and I want you to outfit him suitably.  Whenever I am not with him, you will be and I will hold you responsible for him;  is that clear?"

For the first time, Bobby saw a trace of nervousness in Guthrie's expression as he heard this exquisitely polite and deadly threat.  "Completely, my liege."

"Very well.  I have things to do now.  Bobby, Guthrie will help you with clothes for the court."  Crowley's eyes asked for trust and Bobby looked at him worriedly, unsure.  "I will see you there."

This time he translocated, vanishing without even puffs of air in his wake.  The hunter turned warily to look at the demon Guthrie, who was examining his clothing with a critical frown.  "I can certainly help you, sir.  Will you please come with me and we will see about your outfit."

First was a hairstylist – figured Hell would have plenty of those – who washed Bobby's thinning hair, then trimmed it and his beard with the concentration of a brain surgeon.  Guthrie had walked Bobby past the line of demons evidently waiting for the stylist's services, but took him out another way along one of the gray, stone-walled corridors to what Guthrie called his next appointment.

The place looked for all the world like a top class clothes designer's workshop, not that Bobby had ever seen one outside of some movie.  Guthrie questioned him about his clothing preferences and quickly worked out the cluelessness of his latest charge.  Perhaps Bobby would like him to suggest some items?  How about this classic gentleman's jacket, for example, and these linen trousers....may need to do a bit of alteration when they're on you, sir... At one point Bobby had three people fussing around him  - demons, he reminded himself uneasily – but damn it, they acted like people and seemed painfully glad when he spoke kindly to them.  He firmly vetoed any suggestion of a tie or cravat or whatever the hell that thing was they looped around his neck.  He got the impression that Crowley's court appearances were formal in the extreme, but he wasn't going to be there half-strangled.

In the end Guthrie shooed the tailors away and guided Bobby to a floor-length mirror to take a look at the result.  Nervously, Bobby did.  "Hey, I look okay,"  he said in surprise, gazing at the strangely-dapper gentleman in the dove-grey suit and elegant pale blue shirt.  They had even combed his hair, what there was of it.  "I never had a suit that fit like that.  Well, I've only got one suit but you know..."  Guthrie was looking at him with a faintly puzzled expression, blended with the exquisite butler's courtesy.  "What?  What did I say?"  Bobby asked.  "I mean they did a really good job."

"Yes, sir,"  Guthrie said slowly.

"You got some worry, you can tell me,"  Bobby said.  "I ain't gonna try to get you in trouble if that's what you're thinkin'."

"That's precisely it, sir,"  the demon said at last.  "I've never known anyone the King brought here who was....well, so not belonging in our realm."

Bobby bit down on saying he _had_ been recruited from Heaven, so to speak, but that might not be something good to bandy around in Hell.  "Thanks,"  he said finally, figuring it was probably a compliment.  "It wasn't exactly a planned trip."

"You were with the King when certain disloyal subjects surprised him?"

"Uh, yeah, I was."  Bobby wondered what Guthrie knew about that "surprise," but useless to ask him and maybe dangerous.  "So what happens now, Guthrie?"

"I take you to the audience.  They will be ready to begin when you are there."

The throne room was as Gothic-horror as he remembered, but the pervading smell of blood was mercifully gone.  Sulphur was present, as you'd expect, but faint, and Bobby saw now that none of the assembled demons looked at him with the hunger they had earlier.  Instead there was wariness – Crowley evidently did not make hollow threats – and several bowed their heads respectfully as Guthrie escorted Bobby to the dais where Crowley sat on that damned throne.  He was in another elegant black suit and black silk shirt, but his tie this time was blood red and so was the carnation in his buttonhole.

Crowley's amber eyes commended Bobby's appearance, but he made no snarky remark as the hunter half expected.  He only nodded slightly in approval when Bobby moved to stand beside the throne and a step back, as Guthrie had instructed.  Then he appeared to forget Bobby altogether as the first in a series of applicants came forward between the assembled rows to plead their case with the King of Hell.

Bobby paid as much attention as he could.  This sort of chance was never, but never going to come his way, or any hunter's way, ever again.  He was, ahem, damned sure of that.   He saw, also, that each demon who isolated him, her or itself to speak, was blind terrified.  Castiel's words to him came back from that fog which his time in Heaven had become.  

_Crowley_ _has become erratic and dangerous._

That clearly meant dangerous to his own kind, judging by what he was seeing.  Although how could he be sure?  This was Hell after all;  perhaps that was the usual state of affairs?  Even so, Bobby was sure that mass murder and a blood soaked throne room perhaps wasn't an efficient way to run things, and Crowley had always struck him as efficient.

A young demon – a young host, anyway – but the way he spoke gave Bobby the idea that he was perhaps also young as demons went, came forward as the last applicant scurried off, having been given permission to begin work as a harvester of souls, the lowest rung of the Crossroad demons.  He talked of his supervisor in the Crossroads taking credit, of wanting a promotion to go out on his own and incidentally, credit for the five souls he had taken on his own, without the older demon there at all.  Crowley regarded him thoughtfully, looking rather grim, it was true, but not as though he was about to order the other demon executed for his impudence. 

Then he glanced aside at Bobby, who met his eyes uneasily.  This wasn't the Crowley he was used to.  Even at the worst, when Crowley had dealt with him for his soul, he had...what was the term...he had been _playful._   Everything in the Earth realm was a game to him, as witness the picture he'd taken of himself engaged in that deal-making kiss with Bobby.  This being was not playful.  The carved throne he sat on was a thing of horror; the throne room itself cast shadows of doom around them.  Crowley was a black thing spotted with blood, even his handsomeness was ominous.  Bobby could not, here, imagine touching him.

But as he looked at him, Crowley's demon gaze held an element of appeal, of question.  _What does he want me to do?_   Bobby wondered.  _I'm a hunter.  I'm not gonna say what he should do with his demons_.  _Settle him_ , he thought;  _keep him on an even keel.  That's what I can do for him, wherever I am._   And he smiled a little, trying to reassure, hoping that his Crowley was still in there somewhere.

The King nodded slightly;  turned back to his anxious petitioner.  "You will have your promotion,"  he told him.  "I will be watching your progress."

"Yes, sire!  Thank you, sire!"

"You may go."

The tension in the throne room seemed to go down a notch;  as the audiences continued without mayhem.  The respect never faltered, as due an absolute monarch such as Earth humans had seldom known, but the fear did.  Scare someone too much,  Bobby knew, and you could never trust him, for he'd say or do anything that he thought you wanted.  That went for supernatural creatures just as surely.  Finally, it was over, as he fought to keep from yawning with weariness.

"That will be all,"  Crowley said, his deep-lidded gaze moving across the anxious demonic faces before him.  "Wait – before I dismiss you – has anyone anything to tell me?"

Nothing happened, at least nothing Bobby could pick up, but after a moment Crowley's expression flickered and he looked right at someone in the throng.  "You will speak to Guthrie,"  he said at last.  "Now you may go."

*          *          *

Bobby watched Guthrie take some sort of clue from Crowley's expression and brief gesture, or so he supposed, then the senior demon walked out after the departing petitioners and courtiers.  "You read someone's mind?"  he ventured.

"Let's say someone attracted my attention,"  Crowley said.  He stretched and got off the throne, rubbing his behind with a wince.  "Pity it would be beyond my dignity to add a cushion."

Finally, Bobby could smile, if only slightly.  "Kind of,"  he said.  "So they're gonna talk to Guthrie about the names?  Not you?"

"Guthrie will hold that demon for me,"  Crowley said.  He seemed to catch Bobby's unease and reached out his hand to touch Bobby's arm.  "I can't be seen to appear soft, love.  This is not a place where forgiveness or mercy has any place."

"Not at all?"

"This is Hell."

A shiver ran through Bobby, though he didn't feel any cold.  The temperature was, in fact, precisely bland.  When he'd been captive here; he remembered periods of almost-freezing, then rocketing to spirit-sapping humidity and heat, at the will of the demons who had tormented him.  And Crowley had said they would not have considered that torture, only teasing.  What Crowley was saying now was that he would torture this informant, even though he was giving up the information asked.  Or she.  Did demons really have a gender?  Sure, their vessels did.  But he had to say something.  "You're gonna get the names of the survivors of this....coup.  Can't you stop at scarin' the shit out of the guy and makin' him think you're gonna be looking over his shoulder forever?  You might be able to turn him into someone useful.  You already said you can't ever trust 'em, so you don't need that."

Crowley looked thoughtful, raising an eyebrow in that quirky puzzled way he had, that looked benign but in truth could be anything but.  "I will consider that, Robert.  But now, you need to come with me and then I will need to leave you with Guthrie for a time.  After that, I hope to be able to take you home."

***

Another thing Hell didn't have, far as Bobby could tell, was anywhere comfortable to sit and just kick back.  Creatures that didn't need to eat, drink or sleep also didn't need to sit, apparently.  There was Crowley's apartment, but he didn't feel easy asking Guthrie to accompany him there.  "So no bars, cafes, parks, sports centres or malls,"  he summarised gloomily. "What do you guys do when you're off duty?"

"Hell is a lack,"  Guthrie said quietly, moving beside him as they walked along yet another high-ceilinged yet somehow chokingly confined gothic corridor.  "Whatever sin brought you here, you cannot continue to commit it, and there are no rewards except continued existence."

"What about the demons who go to our plane, you know, to reap souls?  From what I've seen, some of 'em have a good time doin' it."  A flash in memory;  the King of Hell's teasing grin, lifting a glass of whisky in a toast. 

"I was a Crossroads demon before my promotion."

Impossible to tell whether that was fond or not fond reminiscing.  Bobby sighed.  "Well, didn't you enjoy being away from Hell?"

"I'm unable to enjoy anything.  I'm a demon."

 _Well shit, Crowley's a demon and I happen to know there are things he enjoys a lot about Earth!_  

Maybe Guthrie could catch some of the unspoken, the way his King could, though you would never be sure.  He was too careful.  "By the time we are assigned to the sales team,  our humanity has been flayed from us.  We have no bodies of our own.  When we take vessels, they no longer need to do human things.  They are simply vehicles for the purpose.  We get just close enough to humanity for the experience to be a torment, witnessing their hope of a way out of whatever terrible dilemma they are in.  They thank us, when we contract to take their souls.  And then when they are dragged to Hell and are bloodied on the racks, they scream in betrayal, the same way we did.  So no, Mr Singer, I did not enjoy my time in the field."

 _That's me told_ ,  Bobby thought, numbed to the core as he finally heard emotion in Guthrie's controlled voice.  He stayed silent for the time it took to reach a crossroads of corridors, where Guthrie stood, waiting for him to choose their path, then awkwardly turned to the elegant senior demon.  "I'm sorry, Guthrie.  I didn't mean....."

"There's no problem at all, sir."

He was closed down, the perfect servant, and Bobby still had no idea how old he was, when he had died or what he had done to deserve Hell.  No way to ask now, either.  All he could do was ask that they go to where Crowley was; maybe find somewhere to wait outside that area.

The room resembled a rundown train station, which Bobby supposed was appropriate.  He sat down on a bench, leaned back and closed his eyes, making no further effort to talk to Guthrie.  He wasn't even sure he had the energy.

"Robert?"

Gravelly voice, British accent, at his shoulder.  Not the King of Hades holding court;  this was Crowley beside him, shoulder pressed warmly against his.  Bobby smelled the iron stink of blood and opened his eyes abruptly, seeing that Crowley wore what looked like a white butcher's apron over his suit, stained liberally with blood.  "My informant survived and not even flayed, I promise you, Robert.  He's very grateful to you.  I made it clear who he had to thank for his continuing existence."

He sounded anxious, like he was just a man fearing rejection.  Bobby wanted to close his eyes again and not be there, to escape the terrible weight of sadness and loss pressing down on him, not even his loss, but overwhelming.  The ambience of Hell, that destroyed spirit.  Guthrie's voice, _"Hell is a lack."_ Damn it, in a moment he would be sobbing like a child.  "Robert?"  Crowley asked again, softly.  "Take my hand.  We can go back now."  He grasped for the demon's hand blindly, not looking, not wanting to see anything more of Hell, not even Crowley.

There was no sense of movement.  What told him he was back in his house was a warmth of a fire crackling to life in the hearth and clean, living air.  Bobby breathed deeply and opened his eyes, finding that he was sitting on his couch and that Crowley stood by the fireplace, which he had apparently ignited by will alone.  Bobby met the demon's golden-dark eyes for a moment and then looked aside, awkwardly, for he could find no words to say to him and he was fighting a nausea that had flared up when he smelled the fresh blood on Crowley.

"I'll be on my way, Robert, now that you will be all right.  If you want to see me, well, you know two ways to call me now."

Bobby blinked and Crowley was gone.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is a work in progress. I've got most of the next part done. As always, keen to know what you think; should I keep going? I want to play with some ideas on whether Crowley should be "cured" and about how that magic could tie in with a way to remove the Mark of Cain. It's about acceptance and belonging and how important those things are.


	3. Chapter 3

Dean Winchester rolled over in bed and grabbed his phone.  If he had taken the time to note who was calling, he would have hung up, but being only half awake, his mind still caught by last night's dark and bloody dreams, he only grunted, "What?"

"Squirrel," said that familiar British voice, but not as though it intended to taunt.

"What the fuck do you want?"

"Why am I so often greeted that way?"  Even the drama seemed forced, at least to Dean's befuddled mind.  Then Crowley dropped the tone and said flatly, "You need to talk to Singer.  Go and see him, you and the Moose."

"What's the matter with Bobby?  He's only been in the house three or four days – you do something?"

The pause was too long.  Then Crowley only repeated, "Go and see him."

***

The new house was on a quiet street on the edge of town.  Just the sort of place that attracted trouble, in the experience of the Winchester brothers.  They noted Bobby's truck in the driveway and a couple of curious neighbours looking their way as they headed to the front door.  This turned out to be unlocked, not at all Bobby's previous habit, and they went in after a perfunctory knock which got no answer.

Bobby hadn't accumulated enough stuff yet this time around for his house to become cluttered or even messed up much, but Sam had the impression that it hadn't been well cared for over the last few days.  He exchanged swift looks with Dean and they pressed further in, calling out Bobby's name. 

"In here,"  came the eventual reluctant response, barely loud enough to carry.  They followed Bobby's voice to the kitchen, where he sat at the table, a collection of bottles in front of him.  "Good timing, I'm just about out of booze."

"I'm the last to criticise a man for drinking,"  Dean began.

"Well, good.  Don't.  To what do I owe the honour?"  Bobby's words were a bit slurred, but he did manage the whole sentence, which got a nod of respect from Dean.

"Crowley,"  Dean said, half-growl. 

"He called and told us to come see you,"  Sam added, having been briefed by Dean, more or less accurately.

"Why?"

The Winchesters looked at one another again.  Bobby was often gruff, but rarely actively rude without reason.  His face was set in unhappy lines and he did not look at either of them.

Dean sighed and pulled out a chair to sit.  "He didn't say.  He woke me up and I may not have been that welcoming."  Sam chuckled.  "Shut up, Sam.  But if he was a person instead of a slimy bastard of a demon, I would have said he was worried about you.  What happened?"

Bobby picked up the last bottle with beer in it and shook it experimentally before draining it.  Deciding he was just drunk enough, he said.  "Demons showed up to jump him.  He took us to Hell to confront his people.  I saw..."  He shook his head, then winced and stopped.  " I saw him in court, boys.  I saw him being King of Hell.  When he's up here, when he answers a summons or runs one of his damn schemes with our heads, he's playing.  I think he deliberately took a host people would underestimate.  But in Hell itself, he's not playing and his demons know it.  They know that what a host looks like means nothing at all.   He didn't decide to take me there, you know, it wasn't kidnapping or anything, it was part of his fight back against a bunch of demons tryin' to unseat him.  I was collateral damage, not his..."  Bobby stopped, remembering in time who he was talking to.  "It was just real hard to take and I couldn't talk to him, when we came back.  And every time I go to sleep I get these creepy, way too real dreams."  He shuddered a little.  "When did he call you?"

"Last night,"  Sam said quietly.

"I'll make some coffee,"  Dean offered, scrambling up again.  He did _not_ want to hear more about Bobby's relationship problems, not if they involved Crowley.  His own memories of partying with the guy were way too fresh.  With his brother's clattering about as background, Sam tried again.

"I didn't think he was playing with you, Bobby."  Sam blushed as he realised the double meaning of his words.  Bobby growled something wordless.  "I mean, it doesn't seem like some deal..."

"No, he's...."  Bobby rubbed his eyes.  "Shit, I need a shower.  And somethin' to eat."

"Dean, breakfast!"

"What am I, a short order cook?"

"Right now, yeah,"  Sam said.

"He said he wanted to leave the whole show – Hell, bein' King, stay with me here – but after what I saw, I don't know if that's ever gonna be an option..  The showdown's done for now and Hell's got him again, I can see it."

"Did he say he was going to leave Hell and stay with you?"  Sam asked.

Bobby caught the doubtful tone.  "You're sounding like it's one of those things where a married guy tells his mistress he's gonna leave his wife for her, but he never does."

"I just don't think that's possible,"  Sam said at last, aware of needing to tread carefully.  "I mean, he _is_ damned – Hell took him.  And you know, despite everything, maybe he's the best option Hell has!"

"Yeah,"  Bobby said.  He was silent for a few heartbeats, then said, "I'm not sayin' he doesn't want to shake it, but that I know he probably can't.  Hell's the punishment for the damned.  They don't get any more breaks.  No matter how unusual a demon he is,

 _I deserve love_.  Sam heard that broken voice again, the tears in Crowley's eyes and the look of someone who never expected to get that love.  But by the sounds of things; he had had a thing for Bobby all along and by the hugely embarrassed look of Bobby now, their foster-father might just share it.

He looked over at Dean still searching for something or other.  "Hey Dean, give me your phone."

"What's the matter with yours?"

"Out of juice,"  Sam answered calmly.  "I got to make a call."  He left the house again, checked the list of contacts on the phone and called the one he wanted.  It was still a shock to hear that familiar drawling voice on the end of the line. asking, "Dean?"

"No, me.  Get your ass over here, Crowley."

"Allowing for the over-familiarity of the phrasing, where's here?"

"Bobby's place, you complete dork.  I'm in the yard;  he's not going to see you."

"So?" said Crowley from behind Sam.  Sam considered a heart attack, then took a breath and turned around.  The demon was as well turned out as ever, but his expression was grim and unhappy.  Sam guessed he had been hitting the hard stuff himself, except it was probably a lot harder to get wasted when you were a demon king.

"Dean's getting Bobby something to eat, so we got a bit of time,"  Sam told him.  "I did think of asking Dean to call you, but I didn't think he'd want to.  What _did_ you guys do while you were partying around the country?  It's okay, I don't really expect you to tell me.  And I don't really know what to say to you either, except Bobby really needs to talk to you."

"I didn't get that impression when we last parted."

"He told us about you taking him to Hell."

"I hope he explained the circumstances."

"He did but..."  Sam sighed and regarded Crowley, as always in a top of the line black suit, silver tie, everything in order, except he couldn't quite bring off the snappy don't-care attitude at the moment.  Never quite an enemy, never reaching the status of friend, always with his own agenda, yet somehow in all that, Bobby had gotten close to him and he to Bobby.  "I think you looked different to him there."

Crowley digested that and nodded slightly.  "That actually makes sense, Moose,"  he said, his voice quite soft.  "But if I hadn't kept him with me until I knew I had dealt with my problems, he would not have survived the day, or the hour."

"And you think he's safe now?"

"No,"  Crowley said bluntly, "and he's less safe with me around.  While my demons are frightened enough of me, Robert is secure enough, but if I reinforce the idea that he is my weakness..."  He trailed off as though he hadn't meant to disclose that.  "I wish he would stay in your bunker,"  he added abruptly.

"He _is_ planning to come spend some time, get the library in order and read it, of course."   Sam watched the demon.  "You could come with him."

"Don't pretend you'd welcome me."

"You're why we have Bobby back – why Castiel sent him, I mean.  Of course I'd welcome you,"  Sam snapped at him.  That one got through.  Crowley stared at him in shock.  "Now, I'm gonna go call Dean outside and make him go....somewhere or other with me.  Maybe to restock Bobby's booze;  I think he's drunk it all.  You go inside and talk to Bobby and don't listen to any more of his shit than you have to.  Hopefully Dean's told him not to listen to your shit.  Take what you can get."

He turned away from the surprised demon and went into the house.  Crowley murmured brief Latin words and stood unseen as Dean came out of the house with Sam and the brothers headed for the Impala.

When Crowley materialised inside the house, he found himself looking straight at Bobby Singer, his back turned as he went back to the kitchen after confusedly seeing the Winchesters off.  "They just told me off for getting drunk; why the hell are they getting me more booze?"  the hunter grumbled, apparently to himself.

"I'm not sure if they are, love,"  Crowley said.  "Sam's giving me a chance to talk to you.  If you want to talk to me, that is."

Bobby jumped and swore under his breath.  "I oughta be used to that by now."  He turned about to look at Crowley and the demon could see his bloodshot eyes and general dejected appearance.  He forgot about anything Sam might have told him and walked right up to the hunter, reaching out to touch the side of his face. 

"Are you ill, Robert?"  He did remember illness, mostly in the form of hangovers and that looked to be what ailed Singer at the moment.  A thumping headache was keeping time behind Bobby's eyes if that look and the reddened eyes meant anything.  "Sit down before you fall down..."  Instead of any verbal response, even an annoyed grunt, he abruptly found himself enveloped in Bobby's arms, hugged so tightly that it was good he didn't actually need to breathe. 

"They're not getting you,"  Bobby Singer whispered.  "They're not damn well getting you!"

He had meant to explain seriously, regretfully to Crowley that he had seen what he was, what being King of Hell meant, and that anything between them couldn't possibly work.  Crowley was hooked into that terrible, everlasting realm and while he might think he had power, everything about that power worked for Hell.  Crowley was a damned soul like any other stupid bastard who sold theirs for temporary gain and nothing in that deal said you would ever be free again. 

But Crowley had come in here and looked at him worriedly and touched him and Bobby couldn't stand it.  He had no idea how this had happened.  Maybe there had always been an attraction, way back, but you didn't have to give in to wrong impulses.  It wasn't right, to want a man like this, was it, and to want a demon.....?  "Heaven's not gonna want me back,"  he mumbled against Crowley's neck.  Damn it, Crowley's solid warmth felt so good in his arms.

"Well, good, _they_ aren't getting _you_ , love,"  Crowley said, as matter-of-fact as he could manage.  "Could you put me down, Robert?  I'm on pointe at the moment."

"Oh.  Sorry."  Bobby eased his stranglehold and Crowley slid down to stand square once more.  The hunter didn't let go of him, though; his calloused hand stroked the back of Crowley's neck.  "You look a bit frayed at the edges yourself,"  he remarked.

"I thought I had driven you away,"  Crowley said.  "I had no choice but to take you with me, love, but Hell....isn't for the living.  Your minds can't cope with it, to be blunt."

"I've been having some crap dreams."

Crowley nodded as though this was no surprise.

"Guthrie said Hell is a lack,"  Bobby added.

"He's correct."

"I don't think this is what the angels had in mind when Cas sent me back."

Crowley chuckled.  "You have helped me, love.  Are we back then?"

"Yeah,"  Bobby said.  "And we've got work to do."

"The Mark."  Crowley leaned against him.  "I have every confidence in you, Robert, but

you'll remember that I've already tried to work out how to remove the Mark and if I can't do it..."

"I know, I know, you're the King of Hell and I'm a dumb hunter."  Bobby determinedly moved in to kiss him. 

It was perfect timing.  Crowley reached a hand to his face, about to respond and there was a rattle at the door and then the sound of two behemoths thundering in, to wit, the two Winchesters, Dean in the lead, saying blithely, "We got some takeout as well so you've got something to cushion the booze....oh shit, gay senior making out.  Sam, don't come in here!"

"Too late,"  Sam said, shouldering him out of the way.  "Anyway, I'm not looking.  I take it you guys made up?"

"Some of us have moved beyond high school, you two,"  Bobby growled.

"Not from where I'm standing,"  Dean muttered, depositing bags on the kitchen table.  "Okay, we got pizza and fried chicken and there's some Chinese in here somewhere.  Anybody got any food allergies, probably too bad as I'm sure they're all here."

"Salt," said Crowley, deadpan.

"You can watch,"  Bobby told him soothingly.  Sam spluttered, grinning, and Dean continued investigating the supplies, eventually loading up a plate with some of everything and taking it into the living room, which Bobby had furnished with a couch and two chairs courtesy of some neighbour's kerbside salvage offering.  The Winchesters took a chair each, leaving Bobby and Crowley to settle on the couch.  Everyone except the resigned demon ate and drank and eventually subsided into something of a food coma, during which Bobby put an arm back around Crowley and not even Dean commented, though he looked at the King of Hell once or twice as though wondering what had happened to reality.

"We got some stuff to talk about,"  Bobby said, somewhere during the evening, "so it'll be good if you boys can hang around tomorrow."

Dean chewed energetically and swallowed the last piece of pizza.  "I'm not moving."

"Heads up?"  Sam asked.

"I don't know. I need to catch up on the time I've missed. I need to know more about that tattoo,"  Bobby nodded vaguely towards Dean, "and I need to talk to you about the demon trials, Sam..."

"I couldn't finish them because...."

"He would have died, Bobby!"

"I know.  But we need to think about how to stop Dean goin' back to being a demon and as for you, Crowley, I got a question for you and I hope I'm not puttin' you on the spot, but would you want to be human again if you could?"

Crowley was silent so long that Bobby started to say something about tabling that, but the demon touched his hand.

"I don't know, love,"  he said, very quietly.  "I don't really remember what it was like.  That would also mean abdication and as you may have noticed, there are no ex-kings or queens of Hades still breathing, unless we count the occupant of the Pit.  You just don't retire from this job."

"The last Pope quit,"  Sam commented.  His brother, the older hunter and the King of Hell all stared at him as though his brains had fallen out.

"Tell me you aren't comparing me to the Pope, Moose,"  Crowley drawled.  He was surprised to get a reluctant grin from Sam and returned it, still cautious but warmed by the gesture.

"Thanks for that image in my brain,"  Dean muttered. 

"What happens to Hell if you aren't running it?"  Bobby asked the demon tucked comfortably against him.  Right now, it seemed crazy to dwell on just how powerful Crowley was.  He seemed so harmless to look at;  five foot eight in black shirt and pants, his jacket over the back of the couch and the tie loosened for ease.  He also cuddled like a somewhat plump cat, the hunter thought;  no sense of personal space at all.  Embarrassing as hell, but somehow Bobby didn't want to get the demon to move away.

"Someone else takes over,"  Crowley said.  "There's always a ruler of Hell, from Lucifer on.  And the first thing they would do is to clean up behind themselves.  Which would include _me_."

"It's getting late,"  Sam said.  "Let's talk more tomorrow, okay?"

"Sure,"  Bobby said, unhappy with progress but not wanting to anger Crowley.  That would get them nowhere and he had only just made peace with his demon and the fact that he had one.  He showed Sam and Dean to the two small guest rooms, glad that these were at the other end of the hall, past the upstairs bathroom.  He then checked the downstairs quickly, made sure the fire was out and made his way to the master bedroom, lit only by the lamp set by the bed.

Crowley was there, still fully dressed, standing at the window to look out at the night.

Bobby glanced at him, decided to let him alone for the moment and went quietly on with his routine of preparing for bed.  It had fallen back into place as though...as though he had never died and become a ghost.  He shivered a little at the thought, wondering now really what would become of him.  He still wasn't really comfortable with this house, after having the same place for so long, and as for finding himself in a homosexual relationship....He shook his head at himself.  They'd been together half a dozen times by now, so it was stupid to pretend he didn't enjoy it and on some level, need it.  He got into bed, dressed just in boxers, and asked Crowley's back, "You coming to bed?"

Crowley turned, came over and sat on the side of the bed as he undid his tie.  Sometimes he seemed so human, Bobby thought.  Well, he'd had a lot of practice in his time as a salesman for Hell.  He watched Crowley undress, with a kind of precision about his movements, then rise and fuss about with finding a hanger for his jacket and pants, but leave his shirt balled up on a chair for tomorrow's laundry.  He seemed to like to take the time to do this, rather than just cause his clothes to vanish, like he'd done for a joke the previous night.  He came back in just his black boxers and Bobby held the covers back for him.

"I'd like to stay, love,"  he said softly as he slid into bed next to Bobby.

"Then do,"  Bobby answered.

"Not worried about Hell falling to bits behind me?"

That was more like his usual snark.

"I can't tell you how to do your job,"  Bobby said.  "Even now I've seen you do some of it.  But I figure Cas knows more than me about how things got to stay in balance and you – I saw you keep the balance in Hell.  I want you here, but I don't know how that would work out for Hell."

The tension seemed to ease out of Crowley's bare, well-padded shoulders and he sighed deeply, moving his head against the pillow.  "Hell is always a battle, love.  That's part of what makes it Hell.  I want to be here with you and not there, but I don't know if that's even possible or if anyone can stop being a demon."

"Dean did.  And you nearly did."

"That's true,"  Crowley said, his voice low and almost gravelly near Bobby's ear.  "But Dean is not a usual case and also, that story is not yet told.  The Mark is another power.  What you were hinting at, that's inventing magic, not just using it, and believe me, it is no joke to be a guinea pig for that kind of research."

Bobby reached over for him, gently pulling him closer and folded his arms around the demon.  He could feel Crowley's body along his again now, the warmer-than-human heat of him. 

Crowley rested his bearded cheek against Bobby's, for the moment content to stay there.  None of his demons, his people, would ever see him like this, though they knew what Bobby was to him, or thought they did, probably.  Few demons were able to experience love and that he could...he wasn't sure whether that was a help in the long run.

"Head hurts," he muttered.

"Stop thinking then,"  Bobby growled.

"Make me,"  Crowley offered with a suggestive grin.

 _Not used to that talk,_ Bobby thought. _Not used to having anybody in bed with me any more.  So damn long on my own.  Not used to a man, hell, I think of that before I think of what else he is._

"I don't want to make you do any thing,"  he said at last, when Crowley had shifted back to look at him a little concernedly.  "I don't know how to talk to you sometimes, Crowley."

Crowley nodded.  Very carefully he said, "Do you want to rethink this, love?"  He gestured slightly at them, the bed, then paused.  "I promise I will do my best to handle the commute. I won't....go off the rails or lose the plot in Hell or anything.  So long as you don't stop talking to me."

"I don't want to – rethink, I mean,"  Bobby growled.  He felt the heat of an incipient blush in his face, turned aside slightly from the lamplight.

"Hm?'  Crowley asked.

"I don't have a lot of fancy words,"  Bobby said.  "You know, to explain why I....like you as well as – as Karen or women or...Don't say anythin' now or I'm gonna lose the plot myself.  I don't want to think about the future, which I might not have a lot of.  And you, you're hard to kill but you've sort of got to be, considerin' all the things that have tried to get you and might still get you.  So neither of us know where we're gonna be.  But you need to understand I've got my limits.  I haven't been around for centuries like you have.  I don't have magic.  I still don't have a clue why Cas...why the angels think I can help you.  Have helped you, he thinks.  I just..."  He made himself look back at Crowley's face, studying his dark handsomeness.    "We'll work things out.  Whatever it is we've got.  All right?"


	4. Chapter 4

"So I'm not safe?"  Bobby Singer asked, next morning in his kitchen.  "What the hell else is new?"

"Do you really want somebody to answer that?"  Dean responded, looking at Crowley meaningfully.  The demon glared back.  Without looking, Bobby extended a hand to his shoulder, in the moment when Crowley made to stand up, holding him in place.  Crowley could have shrugged it off easily, but instead he sat back and looked away from Dean.

"Point is;  you'd be a lot safer in the bunker _and_ you get to read the lore.  You'd make a much better Man of Letters than we do,"  Sam said hopefully.

Bobby looked at Crowley.  He didn't spell out that despite all that had passed, the demon still didn't feel accepted, though Sam and Dean would undoubtedly let him into the bunker now.  A huge concession, but the demon king's prickly pride had been hurt by past treatment and he was, Bobby thought privately, sulking.  Pile on that the fact that the living underground was, for him, like being back in Hell.  But if he was to find any leads about the Mark, or research how Dean could be helped, he would need that access to the lore.  His was all gone.  Not for the first time, Bobby felt a stab of frustration at his situation.  All his reasons for living, his usefulness to the younger hunters, all burned.  All _dead._   Even Crowley, what more could he do for him?  Crowley was right;  Hell needed him.  If Castiel hadn't been able to help Dean, with all Heaven at his disposal, what use was a cantankerous, elderly hunter with no place in the world.

"Bobby,"  Crowley said softly.  His voice was like smoke, Bobby thought drearily; the British accent blended with that drawl and the low, coaxing tone.  He looked at the man beside him on the couch, realised he still had a hand on Crowley's shoulder and let it drop.  "What's wrong?"

"Just feelin' useless,"  Bobby growled.  "Why don't you boys head home and I'll think about comin 'over."  Sam looked about to argue.  He was the one who had most wanted to talk things over.  But in the end Sam only shrugged.

"You're not useless to any of us,"  he said.  "But I know nobody can talk you out of something you're set on."

"Glad to see I managed to teach you something,"  Bobby retorted.  It took another couple of hours, but he finally persuaded Sam and Dean to head for home.  Dean looked at Crowley and the demon followed them to the door, leaving Bobby behind for the moment. 

"Look after him,"  Dean said, as though pulling the words out of somewhere painful.

"I'll do that,"  Crowley replied and in the next moment Bobby was there, repeating his goodbyes and his promises to call, all but shoving the Winchesters outside.

"Neighbours are watching,"  he muttered, turning away from the door.  "Probably that car;  makes 'em look like gangsters.  Bet they've got me pegged as a drug dealer."

"They won't give you any trouble, darling,"  Crowley replied, his voice smooth as always, but Bobby knew what he meant.  Anyone who _did_ offer trouble was likely to find themselves looking at their guts.

"My other place was a whole lot more private,"  he commented.  "Neighbours further off on the other side of a salvage yard.  I appreciate what the boys did, finding this place, but it's too damn public."  For a moment he thought of a cabin he'd bought for a song years ago and used as a refuge for hunters, once he'd done some basic fixing-up.  It was too far off the track to be easily located and certainly not convenient; no handy stores....or neighbours.  Crowley was looking at him inquiringly and the hunter realised he'd been standing and staring into space like an idjit.

"Senior moment,"  he explained, saw the demon frown as he thought about it and then nod.  "Now, you got some explaining to do.  Why did you sick the boys on me?"

"Concern,"  Crowley answered, with a slight edge. 

Bobby sighed and walked over to him, pulling him close.  Crowley was a little surprised but cuddled readily.  The hunter kissed him on the forehead but didn't say any more. on the matter.  "Don't feel like I can do that with the boys around,"  he murmured finally.  "Or anyone else, for that matter.  It's not the gay thing, well, it is kinda.  Karen and I, we never even kissed in public and now I see couples doing all sorts of things.... If I wanted to get right away from here...from other folks...would you come with me?"  He asked it abruptly, as though Crowley might refuse, which stunned the demon.

"Anywhere you want,"  he replied finally.  "Do you have somewhere in mind?"

"Cabin in the woods, not more'n a few hours drive away but you have to know it's there to find it.  I'm not part of the world any more, Crowley.  I see stuff on the news that talks about things happening one, two years ago and I wasn't here for that.  I wasn't anywhere.  That gives me the chills.  I'm _wrong._   And I don't have more than a germ of an idea about that Mark, but I don't want to say that to Dean.  He and Sam still half expect me to come up with miracles."

"Don't look at me, love, they're not exactly my stock in trade."

Bobby laughed, finally, a rough sound but laughter nonetheless.  "Guess not.  But if Castiel can't and you can't, a miracle's what I'm gonna need."

"Wouldn't say I can't, love, but I haven't hit on what would do it yet.  Curse magic is among the most difficult to undo;  it's designed that way."  Crowley moved away from him a little, his face thoughtful.  Bobby followed him into the living room, looked at the mess the Winchesters had left and then ignored it in favour of watching Crowley pace. 

"Cursed by God,"  Bobby prompted.  "Who has left the building.  Most of the lore says a curse can only be undone by the one who cast it, but there are quite a few examples where somebody tricked their way out.  Nothing about the Mark, of course.  The Mark was never heard from again after it was given to Cain, because he kept away from humanity....until recently."

"Cursed by God,"  Crowley murmured, winced as a stab of fire passed through him.  He made a "ward-it-off" gesture with his left hand and continued to pace. 

"Could a priest do something?"  Bobby wondered.

"A priest, I doubt it.  A true believer....hm."

"Not many priests are true believers,"  Bobby said.  "But some.  Surely the boys would've thought of that.  They've dealt with priests."

"Not the ones who believe, as a rule?"  Crowley phrased that as a question and the hunter nodded.  They continued to brainstorm and Bobby grabbed a notepad – still more comfortable with them than computers – and began to note ideas down.  The day passed, with Bobby only remembering to eat because the demon reminded him, until winter dark was on them again and they were in the kitchen, again because Crowley had told Bobby to eat dinner.  It was remarkably comfortable, despite the topic of conversation.  Crowley had said something about mages – wizards – also being true believers of their kind.

"They believe in power, though, their own.  They don't follow a god,"  Bobby argued.  He flipped the steaks, frowned as a thought skidded past, turned to look at the man seated at his kitchen table, a rickety affair that had come with the house.  Not the solid dependable wood that Bobby preferred.  He could build one, at the cabin...."Hey, is there such a thing as a mage who's also a priest?"

"Not in Christian mythos that I know about,"  Crowley said slowly.  "In pagan religions, certainly,  often that's a job requirement.  But the _neo pagans –_ " and he pronounced the word with contempt, "are just playing.  They don't even do the correct sacrifices.  Odin and Thor and the rest would just laugh at them and use them for target practice.  You're twice the expert at magic that they are."

"Right,"  Bobby said.

"The Mark isn't a Christian curse, though.  It's far, far older, it comes from the time before Jehovah went soft."

"Soft.  Right.  How do you want your eggs?"

"Hard, love, like my...."

"Crowley!"

"Well done,"  the King of Hell said demurely.  Bobby half-glared, half-laughed at him as he dished up a few moments later.  Crowley didn't say anything about not needing to eating this time.  They ate in companionable silence, their minds still turning over the discussion.  This, Bobby thought, was one of the first reasons he had been drawn to Crowley.  He knew almost no one else who could discuss lore knowledgeably, at least, not to the demon's level. 

After dinner, Bobby announced he was going to get a shower and go to bed.  He found Crowley waiting in bed for him when he got there and for once, didn't feel an awkward jolt at the sight of him, wearing just a welcoming grin.  What Crowley wanted was pretty obvious and Bobby, tired though he was, found he wasn't adverse to the idea either.  He slipped under the covers beside Crowley and hit the light switch on the wall to plunge them into decorous darkness before he reached for the King of Hell beside him.

Strong arms settled about him and he felt the warmth of Crowley's body against his own.  Sleep suddenly seemed quite a bit further off and he found himself asking, "So, you interested..."

The words were cut off as Crowley kissed him.

Later, Bobby felt himself drifting off in a post-coital fuzz, lying against Crowley, an arm over him.  Something the demon had said before the love making was niggling at his mind, something about Bobby being an expert....Magic, that was it.  As though the few spells he'd put together from poking through old books meant anything.  "Crowley,"  he murmured, "I'm technically a magician, right?"

"That's someone who works with magic, love, so yes, of course."  Crowley sounded as alert as he had this morning.

"So....if someone who is both priest and mage could maybe get rid of the Mark...if I got ordained, could _I_ do it?"

Crowley thought that over for an uncomfortably long time.  "No," he said.

"That was definite."

"I've had the chance to think a bit.  Cain has had the Mark for millenia and for most of that time, as we discussed, there were priest mages.  He would certainly have sought their help.  They were the hunters and the Men of Letters of their times.  Sorry to shoot you down, darling.  I thought for a while that was a viable option myself."

He rubbed his cheek against Bobby's chest and the hunter stroked his back.  The gestures of affection came more readily now, he thought, with a jolt that felt like lightning through his heart.  Somewhere along, not even realising it, he had fallen in love with Crowley.

"Would have given us a problem anyway if I got ordained,"  Bobby murmured.  Crowley chuckled.

"Just a little."

"Is there _any_ way out for Dean?"

"I don't know."

They were both asleep when Bobby's phone rang, around four am.  It was Sam Winchester, saying that Dean had disappeared from the bunker.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I've found it as difficult as anyone to think of a solution for the Mark, so this has gone slowly and concentrated more on the growing bond between a hunter and a demon. In this AU there is no Rowena, but there is, of course, angst between Sam and Dean over what is happening and what will happen, if Dean keeps the Mark. So some of the events of Brother's Keeper will still happen in the next chapter. Sort of. I also apologise for the lack of detailed smut. It's not my forte. If anyone wants to help improve the smut, let me know! :-)


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Here I play with Brother's Keeper. My aim with this story is to explore what changes might happen if there was no Rowena (actress is excellent but I do not like the character!) and if, instead, Crowley had someone who loved and supported him. This does, of course, mean there's no Book of the Damned/evil witch to do the spell to remove the Mark. 
> 
> Dean is going to do what Dean does, because his rampaging and his summoning of Death is independent of the whole Rowena/BOTD storyline. He does not, in short, even know it's happening. But when Sam goes after him, Bobby and Crowley will be with him.
> 
> This means much less of the Sam and Dean angst, so a sort of gentle warning for those who are into that. I'm also not interested in Dean/Castiel, so I don't feature that unless in the form of some Crowley snark. I happen to believe that love can happen in the form of friendships and be as close as any with a romantic element. That said, here's the next chapter.

"Dean trashed his motel room,"  Sam said as though, Crowley thought with amusement, this was such an unusual thing for a Winchester to accomplish.  The Moose wearily ticked points off on his fingers as they stood in a mostly deserted car park beside Dean's beloved Impala.  "He left me a note saying "she's all mine" – the car,"  he actually thought to add to Crowley.  "Also he was apparently a complete – and kinda creepy – dickbag to Rudy..."

"Who he _apparently_ then murdered,"  Bobby said with the grim tone of one addressing a truth he doesn't want but will face anyway.   He had known the other hunter, mostly as a voice on a phone, but known him nonetheless, but he pushed the grief away.  He would deal with that when he had done what he had to as regards Dean.  If only he knew what that was.

"Yeah, according to the girl he rescued from the vamps, and the local sheriff,"  Sam agreed.  He waved his cell phone like exhibit one.  "Now he calls me!  After I've sent a trillion texts and calls his way that he's flushed down the toilet, he calls me.  If you hadn't asked me to wait for you to get here, Bobby, I'd be with Dean now."

"Or you could be with Rudy,"  Bobby growled.  "You know yourself Dean's unstable and you're gonna just rush over to him?"

"Well, I didn't, did I?"  Sam gave him a truculent look Crowley thought made him resemble a giant toddler thwarted from one of his whims.  Bobby, for whom Sam was more of a father than his own, took it in his stride.

"No, because I asked you to wait,"  he said more gently.  "He give you any idea on the phone?"

"He said he was done."  Sam's face was set in misery.  "But if he was going to kill himself, why did he let me find out where he was?"

"We'll work that out,"  Bobby told him.

"I'm sorry I woke you up.  I was kind of freaking out and not thinking straight or I'd have waited.  I'd just come from the scene where Dean totalled the vamps."

"I could have helped you find him faster,"  Crowley said.  Bobby sighed and nudged him in the ribs with his elbow and added a "Not Helping!" glare when the demon king let out an offended noise.

"We'll talk on the way,"  he said.  "But you got to be ready, Sam.  We have to restrain him and shut him down, you know that.  If we come up with a cure, we got to have Dean right there, not rampaging across the country.  You're the only one he's likely to let close enough."

"He would you,"  Sam said.

"Don't think so;  now Crowley's here, Dean's got me in the Not So Trustworthy box."

They drove.  Sam behind the wheel, Bobby riding shotgun and Crowley in the back seat, hanging over Bobby's shoulder to comment on everything from Sam's driving to how boring the scenery was to what they were likely to face at the other end.  Sam wondered whether it would be worth driving into a tree to shut Crowley up, but then he happened to glance at Bobby after one particular instance of Crowley-snark and saw the relaxed, affectionate look on the elder hunter's face as he looked at Crowley.  He had been worried for a while about how lost Bobby seemed to be, back in his life.  Now, Sam said nothing and kept driving.

They ended up outside a Mexican restaurant which stood alone in a windy, desolate landscape.  "Wonder where their customers come from,"  Bobby muttered.  "Out of the ground?" 

Sam shrugged, his gaze on the building's front door.  "Looks like an ex-restaurant to me."  When Bobby made to follow him, Sam turned about and held out his hand.  "Not right away, Bobby.  I need to go in and talk to Dean by himself.  All of us – might tip him over the edge, you know."

"We'll be right here,"  Bobby said, accurately reading that Sam was not in a mood to negotiate.

"Don't come in until I call for you,"  Sam added.  Crowley moved up beside Bobby, halting there, and Sam looked at him, noting absently that there seemed to be flecks of gold in Crowley's eyes, like flames.  He and the demon regarded one another, part of an isolated moment in time where it didn't matter at all what Crowley was to him, what he had done and what he was. 

"We'll be here, Moose,"  he murmured and Sam almost smiled.  Then he turned about and opened the door, slipping through and shutting it quietly behind him.  At once, Crowley stepped up to it and leaned his head close.  "Damn, can't hear what they're saying,"  he complained.

"You don't have some sort of demon mojo you can use?"

"Only if I want to let Dean know I'm here.  He may not be precisely a demon now, but he's that close."  Crowley held thumb and forefinger barely apart.  "Someone else is there but they're even further away than Dean and Sam."  Abruptly the voices raised, Bobby could now hear them too, but more like growls and shouts than human speech.  Then a heavy thump and crash, and another.  Bobby muttered angrily and made for the door, but Crowley was in his way.  "Move!  There's a fight going on."

"Which Moose asked us to stay out of, else why did he specifically say wait until he called us?  Not wait till we heard an alarming noise."

The yells died away and Crowley leaned his head back to the door.  "More talk, talk,"  he complained.  Then his expression became grim and he motioned urgently to Bobby.  "Get in there.  He wants you."

"Which one?"  Bobby hissed, but Crowley's hand on his lower back propelled him through the doorway with unsettling strength.  The demon followed swiftly and let the door bang closed.  On purpose, Bobby guessed, to freeze whatever had just happened in here.  There was Sam, on his knees for godssake, Dean standing above him and a few paces away, a cadaverous figure in black clothes, with a ghostly pale face, holding a weird-ass bladed weapon on a long stick.  He'd seen that figure somewhere before, at the edge of his memories.

There was an unexpected, aromatic odour that didn't fit with the unsettling dread Bobby felt.  Who the hell would have been cooking Mexican food?  It could only have been Dean....and was that being actually snacking from a tray while Dean stood over his brother.   Dean was currently staring at Bobby and not in a friendly way.  "You shouldn't be here,"  he ground out, and shot a restive, angry glance at Crowley but said nothing to him.  "This is between me and Sam."

"Dean, they came with me.  Okay, so I thought I would have to call them in, like, aloud...."   Sam craned his neck to look up at Crowley, which the King of Hell had to admit he appreciated for a change. 

"Sam, get up,"  Bobby said.  "What's goin' on?  Who's that?"  Even as he asked, though, the knowledge seeped into his mind like icy water

Dean looked away.   Death gave Crowley a genial nod;  acknowledging a colleague.  Then he looked back at Bobby and his gaze became intense as he studied the older hunter from head to foot.  "How interesting,"  he mused.  "Dean, I believe I would like to alter our arrangement."

"You don't want me to...."  Dean looked at Sam, who returned a what-the-fuck expression.  "What was all that about wanting to make sure there were no more Winchesters?"

"Oh no,"  Death corrected.  "I still feel this world would be much more....ordered without either of you.  However, since you are currently legitimately alive, I require your consent to change that status.  We do now have an interesting complication here, do we not, Mr Singer?  Or am I mistaken that I've processed you through the afterlife on a previous occasion?  You gave one of my Reapers quite a bad time."

Bobby's mouth felt dry and he couldn't look away from Death's eyes.  Literally couldn't.  A chill flowed through him and he realised he was shivering, his heart beating harder.  Memories which had become strangely vague, out of focus, were now back full force;  memories no living man should hold, thoughts of pain and horror and the Reaper coming for him, the Reaper who served this entity....the avatar of Death....entropy always won.  Suddenly his legs, the legs Crowley had inexplicably restored for him, gave way and he crashed to his knees, fighting weakness and nausea and the terrible cold possessing him.  "Crowley,"  he managed to say, but the King of Hell was already there, throwing himself down after Bobby, muttering words in that tongue of demons, words of warding which disintegrated before Death's curious dark regard.

Crowley got an arm around him, hugging him strongly as though afraid Bobby would not feel the touch, but still Bobby could not look away from Death.

"Very interesting,"  Death mused.  "You shouldn't be here.  You're not a ghost or an angel;  you're quite simply restored to a facsimile of your body.  I think we can utilise this, Dean.  You pass the Mark to Mr Singer, I put him back where he's supposed to be and the Mark will be no more than an intriguing tattoo."

"No,"  Dean growled.  "I said I wouldn't pass it to anyone – least of all Bobby!  Even if you kill him again, he's not going to go back to Heaven.  He's been screwing Crowley;  don't you think fucking with the King of Hell is gonna get his pass cancelled?"

"You'd know, darling,"  Crowley said smoothly.

Dean's face tightened with fury....and embarrassment.  "I was a _demon_."

"You were a demon unmarked by the Pit or by any form of torture or even a hangnail,"  Crowley said, his tone flat and his face expressionless.  "You participated in whatever form of fun you wanted, whether it was bloody murder, bar girls in triplet form.....or me.   But I know what the Mark is doing to you now and I will forget what I've heard you say, my Knight.  And you will let go of Robert Singer, Death.  He is not yours."

"They're all mine,"  Death disagreed, selecting another morsel from one of the trays before him.  "Even you, once."

"You took him once,"  Crowley said, painfully aware of how close to pleading he was.  "The angels sent him back for a specific purpose.  I would consider it....a particular favour if you would look aside from him now."

_He's sucking my life, Crowley.  I can't stand up, I can't even look away from his eyes._

Death nodded thoughtfully.  "I do see that, Crowley, and having you owe me a favour could indeed be useful, but I'm afraid that would be bending the rules a touch too far." 

"I know the Winchesters are two exceedingly large thorns in your arse, Death,"  Crowley said.  "But why should mortals bother you to that extent?"  He was honestly bewildered.  Death was forever and had only to wait.

"Dean Winchester has made a bargain with me,"  Death explained.  "He wanted me to kill him, but that is not possible while he bears the Mark.  Instead, I'm willing to transport him elsewhere, perhaps not even on this Earth, where he will live but never harm another living soul.  However, this will leave the ever-loyal Sam, who will not rest until he undoes what I have done and recovers his brother, with or without the eternal Mark of Cain, which holds shut the doors of the world against the Darkness.  I am about to see that Sam does not cause such a problem.  Unfortunately, leaving Bobby Singer behind would be as risky as leaving Sam."

"Darkness?"  Crowley asked.  He could see that his ignorance of that particular bad had jolted Dean, who was looking from his brother to Death and back again, trying to ignore Crowley while not missing a word of the demon king's conversation.

"As a demon you are young,"  Death gave him that benign, terrible smile.  "Ask Castiel;  he should know.  But now, I'm afraid we must move on."

Crowley crouched before Death as though in homage, his arm over Bobby's back, hugging him close.  He knew how it looked and he didn't, pardon him, give a damn.  He tried to grin but it came out as a grimace.  To Bobby, as softly as he could, he said, "What's going on with you, love?  Say the word and I'll get us out of here."

"No,"  Bobby muttered.  "Can't leave the boys."

"Fuck the boys."  Crowley rested his chin on the top of Bobby's head and stared at Death.

"I'll do it,"  Dean said.  "Damn you, _I'll_ do it."

Death finally looked away from Bobby, giving his attention wholly to Dean.  Bobby collapsed in Crowley's arms like a puppet with its strings cut.  Whatever Sam saw in Dean's eyes, it made him nod, slowly, his gaze never leaving that of his brother.  The darkened restaurant was silent as though no sound was even possible, and the aromas of the food were an abomination.

"Please,"  said Death, handing his scythe to Dean.  "Do the honours."

"Dean!"  Bobby growled, struggling, but he could not even pull free of Crowley, let alone stand.  "Crowley, do something."

"If the King of Hell releases you,"  the cadaverous Death said, still regarding Sam and Dean, "your remaining life energy will flow out of you within seconds.  He is feeding you energy but he must touch you to do it."

"I shouldn't even be here,"  Bobby whispered urgently.  "Please, Crowley."

"I...."

And Dean struck.

The terrible scythe of Death, avatar of all weapons, swung swiftly in the hands of the proto-Knight of Hell.  Away from the stunned Sam, up and slicing easily through the torso of its master.  Who had barely time to look surprised, before his vessel crumbled like a sandcastle enveloped in a storm.  Dean dropped the scythe as though it was radioactive, stretching out his arm and shoving his sleeve up as though the Mark pained him.

It was not there.  Dean stared at his arm and rubbed at the bare, unmarked flesh, then turned his arm around as though it was possible he could have forgotten precisely where the Mark was.  Sam scrambled to his feet and both of them stared at nothing.  On the boards of the floor,  Bobby coughed in Crowley's arms.  "I'm okay,"  he managed.  "Felt like all the blood was bein' drained out of me but once he – Death fell apart, I was back to normal.  Dean.  Did you just kill Death?"

"Where the fuck is the Mark?  Has it gone invisible?"  Dean looked at Crowley, pleading as though he hadn't been willing to cut him dead moments before.  The King of Hell sighed.

"Come here,"  he said.  "Let me see."

Dean walked over and awkwardly crouched in front of Crowley – a few bruises and stiffness coming from that scuffle,  Crowley thought – who reached out and grasped Dean's forearm, concentration on his face.  After a second he released the hunter.  "No Mark, nothing."  The building rattled as though about to fall over and then they all felt an earthquake shuddering its way beneath them, like waves of earth.  "It's the first curse,"  the demon said slowly.  "I don't see how....wait, where's that scythe?"

They looked around but there was no scythe.  No disintegrated bits of Death on the floor either.  It was as though he had never been there.

"It looks like what you just did – kill Death with Death's own scythe – has cancelled out the Mark of Cain,"  Crowley said finally. "Just a theory, of course, but mine, which gives it more weight."

"We should get out of here,"  Sam interrupted.  "If that was an earthquake, there could be aftershocks on the way, or a worse quake."  He and Dean exchanged that swift, speaking look which said there were secrets, for once secrets which neither of them was hiding from the other.  Only from Bobby and Crowley, who had no chance to press the issue as the two Winchesters led the way outside and stopped in shock as they saw the black fog pouring from holes in the ground like a volcano's geysers, and rolling over the land like a huge black cloud thrown down from the heavens.  No, not a cloud, waves, bringing the earthquakes coughing from the earth.

"I will come back,"  Crowley said, then he gripped Bobby's arm.

"No!"  Dean yelled.  "We can drive out; look after Bobby!"

Crowley shrugged and vanished, with whatever Bobby would have said lost in the ether.


	6. Chapter 6

 

Crowley materialised within the bunker, still securely gripping Bobby Singer's arm.  The hunter coughed and leaned on him, turning his head away while he dry retched and finally eased.  "That....is a _shit_ way to travel."

"Saved your life, probably,"  Crowley said. "I didn't have time to shield you;  you got a taste of a soul being dragged to Hell, I'm afraid."

Bobby belatedly realised they were in the bunker's war room, with its table depicting a map of the world and various obsolete communications equipment around them;  planning for a war that the Men of Letters lost, he thought.  "Hey, why are we here and not at the house?"

"Because until we work out what your precious boys have caused, better we're in a secure location,"  Crowley told him, barely holding on to his patience.  "I need to have my demons report so I can find that out, so I'll need to leave you on your own.  I wasn't going to do that where you could be harmed."

His voice was sharp but not, Bobby thought, directed anger at him.  Crowley was honestly frightened for him and he had followed instinct to the safest place he knew...well, outside of Hell, which was not safe for Bobby.  He reached out for the demon and pulled him into a hug, kissing the side of his face.  "Come back when you can, okay?  And thank you."

Crowley waved his thanks off, but accepted the kiss, returning one of his own to Bobby's lips.  "Quick as I can.  Please wait for me here!"

"I'll call the boys,"  Bobby said, reaching for his phone.  "Be like old times, except this is their library.  And, well, you're here."

He was talking to empty air.  Damn, he'd never get used to that.  There was no answer on either Sam or Dean's phones;  Bobby shrugged and pocketed his phone.  He could try again later.  Meanwhile, there had to be a television or a computer somewhere here so he could see whether mainstream media had picked up on any unusual events, even if they did call it swamp gas.  He found Dean's laptop still in his room and sat down on the younger hunter's roughly made bed.  Minutes later, he swore aloud and grabbed his phone to try the Winchesters again.  Still nothing.

He paced.  There was plenty of bunker to pace in;  silent and a bit chilly, full of ghosts, at least in the emotional sense.  Bobby thought he could go awhile without meeting another of the restless dead, especially since he had been one.  Eventually he tipped something out of a tin into a pan and made some supper, eating without paying attention, and searched the fridges until he found a six pack of beer hidden at the back with SAMMY, DO NOT DRINK! written on it in black marker.  He took it with him, and the laptop, to the room he had occupied here, to wait.

And woke, to the sound of distant banging on the door.  He stumbled to his feet and through the still-lit corridor outside his room, through the War Room and managed to navigate the stairs up to the door.  He could hear voices outside quite clearly, though the door was heavy, but frowned as he tried to make out who it was and what they were saying.  Sounded like Sam out there, yelling at him to open the damn door.  With all the junk in this bunker, they didn't have a spyhole or a CCTV set up?   Then he heard that drawling British voice as clearly as though Crowley was whispering in his ear.  "Seems they've set up the demon barriers again, love.  Just open this door, would you?"

Bobby reached for the handle and then stopped.  He could not have said what caused him to do so, only a cold, edgy sensation in him, his old instincts telling him that if he opened the door, he would be dead.  He stood there, staring at the door, for a long time.  The voices rose, mingling with one another, Sam, Dean, Crowley.  The only one not being imitated – for he was sure now – was Castiel.  He moved back and made his way back to the War Room, found a chair at random and there he waited.

"Bobby!  Hey, Bobby, are you all right?"  He woke again, neck stiff and uncomfortable, for the moment not sure where he was or if the previous waking had been a bad dream.  No, he was in a chair, not a bed, and surrounded by Winchesters, who smelled of smoke and earth and not washing and blood and .....Bobby Singer opened his eyes.  Sam smiled at him from inches away.  He was a mess, with wounds on his face as though he had been punched...oh yeah, he had, by Dean, who was on Bobby's other side. 

"Where's Crowley?"  he husked, his throat dry as though he had been eating sand.  He had heard Crowley's voice from out there in the windy dark.

"Let me through."

Crowley spoke conversationally, not mustering half the menace Bobby knew he could.  For a few moments he couldn't even see the demon, who seemed to have come in with the boys or after them.  Then Sam's hand grasped Dean's collar and tugged him to one side, giving Bobby room to get stiffly out of the chair.  Now he saw Crowley, mostly immaculate in his black suit, though his hair was a mess.  Bobby advanced on him and wrapped his arms tightly around the demon, almost sobbing in relief, not giving a shit that Sam and Dean were watching.

"Were you here?"  he whispered.  "I don't know what the time is, but must've been a few hours.  I heard you...you and the boys yellin' at me to let you in."

Fire flickered for a moment in Crowley's eyes.  He shook his head slowly.  "No, love,"  he said.  "I went back just in time to save your heroes' bacon, but we only arrived now."

Bobby moved his hands to frame the demon's face and kissed him almost desperately.  Crowley returned it and for a wonder, neither Sam nor Dean made any remark as Bobby let him go to breathe.  "I don't know what it was, but I got the feeling, if I opened the door, I was a dead man.  Again."  His attempt at humour was weak, he knew.  "I tried to find out what's goin' on but it's crazy.  Most of the channels are off the air and the ones that are on, they're just running stuff from security cameras, showing hundreds of people stumbling around the streets in a bunch of cities.  Some of 'em looked like they were eating people, like damn zombies.  Where's your angel?  He and his lot doing anything about it?"

"No word from Heaven,"  Dean said, clearly aware of the irony.  "From Cas – yeah.  He's gone to Jody in Sioux Falls;  bring her and the girls here if he can, keep them safe there if he can't.  Since he's not been here, I assume he's gone for option two.  Or has he?"

Bobby shook his head.  "I didn't hear him among the voices.  Damn it, that sounds like I've lost the plot or the booze has finally rotted my brain.  You know what's doing that?"

"No,"  Dean said and rubbed his eyes.  He and Sam both looked close to collapse, Bobby thought.  "I have to sleep, man.  We'll have a council in a few hours, you, us...and you."  He nodded to Crowley, a little hesitant, and the demon returned an ironic look, but nodded back.  When the brothers were gone, he held his arm out to Bobby.

"Shall we retire, love?"

"I wish,"  Bobby muttered but took the arm.  "I am totally creeped out now.  All my years as a hunter and voices of folks that aren't there scare me off."

"Something was there, love, make no mistake,"  Crowley said softly as they reached their room.  Bobby felt comforted by the door he closed behind them, illusion though it was, but comforted more by the presence of the man with him.  "The destruction of the Mark let something in."

"Dean couldn't really kill Death, could he?  Death's not a person!  That was his...his mask or puppet or something."

"Avatar?"

"Yeah.  So why are there zombies?"

"They may not be zombies."

"They're eatin' people.  That's close enough to zombies for me!"

Crowley took his coat off and hung it carefully on a hanger in the small closet, then continued slowly with the rest of his suit.  Bobby undressed with rather less ceremony and got into bed.  Nervousness all gone, he realised, or maybe he was just too beat to care about anything except that Sam, Dean and Crowley had made it back, and that Crowley was with him.  He turned to face the demon....no, damn it, he thought, he wasn't going to call him that.  This was a man who looked at him soberly, who seemed to love him beyond any reason he could work out. "Here we are back in the burrow,"  Crowley said lightly, now in just his boxers, as he settled into the bed beside Bobby.  A snap of his fingers and the light turned itself off.  Only the light showing under the door from the corridor relieved the otherwise cave darkness of the room.

 "Sorry,"  Bobby murmured, "I haven't been able to sleep much.  Things 'n people keep wakin' me up."

 "I'll contain myself somehow, love,"  Crowley whispered back into his ear.  "Rest now."

 Bobby did, they all did, gathering strength to deal with the chaos which roiled outside their refuge.


	7. Chapter 7

Council of war.

After a night which they all dealt with in their own ways, they met in the room which the Men of Letters had designated as their council chamber.  If Dean had woken out of nightmares, calling Castiel's name into the emptiness, he said nothing about it and nor did Sam, who had heard him.  Sam had his own terrible dreams of Charlie and Kevin and other friends he had been unable to help.   And if Bobby had woken with a nightmare of Heaven holding him helpless in a calm and gentle prison, he didn't mention that either, or the fact that he had turned to Crowley in the dark and the King of Hell had given him freely what he needed.

"Cas called me,"  Dean said, his voice rough and weary.  "Somewhere at the arse end of dawn.  They're okay but they're hunkered down.  And before you ask, Jody and Donna won't come here.  They're mustering the whole damn city, sounds like, building some kind of stockade.  Alex always thought the zombies would show up; she knows all sorts of weird stuff and as for Claire, nothing's gonna hold that kid back.  They want _us_ to join them."

"Claire says that too,"  Sam mentioned, tapping the side of his laptop computer, on the table in front of him.  "The Internet's gone crazy...crazier.  Hard to tell if anything's accurate....government abandoned Washington, the National Guard called out in all the states, martial law.  We're not supposed to approach anybody exhibiting signs of, uh, rabid behaviour.  Dean, if what you did set this off, why the fuck aren't we sick?  Why are there survivors?  I mean, I'm not knocking the fact Jody and some of her people are okay, but why are they?"

Everyone looked at Bobby, who sighed, though he had been expecting it.  When somebody had been fixing your problems since you were in elementary school, it could be hard to believe they couldn't fix everything.  "Anybody say how it started?"  he asked.  He was more than happy for Sam to be his Internet filter.

"Everyone's got a theory,"  Sam shrugged. 

"What's Jody's?"

"She says she woke hearing a ruckus in the street and thought it was some neighbours carrying on, but when she went out to check she found one guy absolutely off his nut, growling and chewing on the guy he'd been fighting.  Some other people who tried to stop it had been bitten.  She shot the zombie guy and figured that was the end of it.  Called up her people on the radio to hold the crime scene and couldn't find any of 'em.  None of the on duty cops answered.  So she and Donna went into Jody's station and they found...."  Sam grimaced.  "You can guess what they found, okay?  So it's transmitted by biting.  They don't know who was patient zero in Sioux Falls or anywhere, it's like it erupted in a dozen places at once.  You got somebody going zombie and the person next to them being okay, until they were bitten, I mean.  Jody thinks maybe somebody magicked something up in a lab and let it loose on purpose, like a terrorist thing."

"Can you get her on the line?  I think we should get an update from her."

"Sure,"  Sam said and hit the speed dial for Jody.

Crowley wore a resigned, ironic expression, which Bobby noted when he looked at him.  Oh yeah, the hunter remembered, all that crap where Crowley had lost the plot and started going after people the boys had saved.  He'd gone on some crazy blind date with Jody and damn near killed her.  If he _had_ , well, Bobby didn't think he could have gone near Crowley after that.  As it was...He reached out and took Crowley's hand, squeezing firmly and holding on as the demon looked at him.

" _Sam_?" came Jody's voice, on speakerphone.  _"It's good to hear your voice.  Are you and Dean and Bobby all right?  I can't believe we thought he was dead for all that time."_

"Yeah, well,"  Sam said awkwardly, "he was in hospital a long time with amnesia and I guess then he just wanted a fresh start."  Bobby raised his eyebrows at Sam, who mouthed, "What was I supposed to tell her?"  Aloud, Sam went on.  "We're all fine, Jody.  Uh, and Crowley is here as well."

 _"I hope you've got him in chains in your dungeon_!"

"And I hope nobody can hear you saying that,"  Sam said.  "It sounds....wrong, you know?  Look, Crowley's helping us.  It's a long story but he's...."

" _A complete douche bag.  You know what he did to me?  And almost did to me?  Just bring him within range..._ "

Sam grinned, unable to stop himself.  Dean still didn't seem much in a laughing mood, but he quirked an appreciative eyebrow.  Crowley's face was an aggrieved study.  As Jody got to " _...crossbow bolts doused in salt with devil's traps carved into them..._ "  Bobby lost his own battle and guffawed loudly, still chuckling as he placed a kiss on Crowley's forehead.

 _"Is that Bobby?"_   Jody stopped her litany.  " _Look, Bobby, you know you and the boys are welcome, but why on earth have you got the King of Hell with you?  He's probably got something to do with this whole insane thing..."_

"Well, no, he hasn't,"  Bobby got enough control to say.  "There's....a lot changed, Jody."  He had no wish to come out to her on speakerphone with Sam and Dean _and_ Crowley listening in.  "It's a package deal.  Anyway, we haven't decided what we're doin' yet.  We haven't seen what's goin' on in Lebanon, let alone anywhere else."

"It won't be good, Bobby."

"I know, Jody, I know."  He looked at Sam and the younger hunter took over, letting Bobby sit back.  Jody talked about groups, even herds of people affected, sweeping through residential blocks and wiping out anyone there.

" _Nothing holds.  They don't feel pain, or if they do, it doesn't stop them just bashing into walls until they bring them down.  They don't move fast but they don't stop.  There's maybe thirty people with us here; don't know how many other groups made it.  We need you guys."_

"We'll get back to you tonight, Jody, or you call if you need to,"  Sam said.  "By then we'll have a better idea of what's going on locally and I want to try to contact as many other hunters as we can too."  Jody asked for numbers so that she could try to swell the numbers in Sioux Falls and Sam passed on several who might be in the area or willing to travel there, including Garth Fitzgerald.  "I tried to call him and his number was busy, which indicates he's still okay and networking like mad,"  Sam said.  "He'll drive you crazy but he's useful."

Bobby tapped Crowley's shoulder and the demon rose and went with him away from the table.  "Don't take all that personally," he began.

"Excuse me, but it sounded bloody personal to me,"  Crowley said, without rancour.  "Especially the bit where she's going to have me dragged over a salt lick and buried up to my neck."

"You think it's not justified?"

"I didn't say _that...._ "

His grin was reluctant but sincere and Bobby smiled back in some relief.  "Come here,"  he said suddenly and Crowley found himself wrapped in Bobby's arms, witnesses and all.  His face was pressed against the hunter's chest, which didn't bother him one bit.

"You know,"  he said, rather muffled, "she's likely to be even more upset with me once she wises up.  Which she will whether you tell her or not, love, once she sees us.  Just saying."

"You think we ought to join up with them?"  Bobby asked, shifting back a little.  It looked like things were finishing up with the phone call and the brothers were looking towards them.

"You can't do anything from here,"  Crowley replied, "and when you lose your Internet, that's it.  I can get to Hell from anywhere, of course."

"Did you learn anything, apart from rescuing Sam and Dean?  For which, thanks."

"Only that deals are up around the world as the panic rises,"  Crowley told him.

"Can deal magic get rid of the zombies?"

"Only in a limited sense, as in around the asker.  And phrasing of the deal is very important."

"I bet,"  Bobby muttered.  "I mean, anything about how it started?"

"Not yet."

"We need to check out the town,"  Dean said as Bobby and Crowley came back to the table.  "Are you guys up for being a demonic taxi duo and Sam and I will take the Impala?"

Bobby groaned and Crowley patted his arm soothingly.  "I'll make it good for you this time, I promise, darling,"  he said.  Sam gagged and Dean muttered something, which made Crowley beam cheerfully at them both.  They worked out the details:  Observing only, don't engage with zombified individuals.  See if any representatives of the government survive or if National Guard troops are anywhere on the horizon.  Back at the bunker by nightfall.  Phone contact to be maintained between their groups.

"No heroics,"  Bobby warned the Winchesters.  "No crazy stuff."

"Same thing, aren't they?"  Crowley murmured and Bobby elbowed him in the ribs.

"One other thing we got to talk about,"  he said, "and that's what happens if we find survivors.  I mean, you want us to bring people back here?"

Sam and Dean looked at one another.  Even after the shattering events of the past few months, destroying much of the trust between the brothers, there was still that ability to communicate silently, to convey what had to be decided. "If this really is apocalypse,"  Dean said, "by which I mean nobody's getting this thing under control and moving on, then yeah, if you find anybody healthy who needs help, I guess bring them back here and we'll work out what to do with them after that."

They went out into the streets of the little town, whose sole claim to fame was being the exact centre of the United States.  It was not as Dean and Sam remembered it, though its 200-some citizens and some tourists shambled through the town.  The brothers drove slowly around the town perimeter while Bobby and Crowley reconnoitred on foot.   At one point the demon stared thoughtfully at a group of oncoming "walkers," which name Bobby said came from a television show Sam had recommended.  The boy had said it would actually be great training for hunters.

"Look at their faces,"  he said to Bobby.  "What do those expressions make you think of?"

"Like they're asleep,"  Bobby said softly, not wanting to attract attention. "But they're reactin' to us, they're coming to us."

"There's no one awake in this town,"  Crowley nodded. 

"Let's get out of this wind,"  Bobby said, and took the demon's offered hand.  Crowley did not stay with him, once he had brought Bobby to sit in the Impala's back seat and nearly give the Winchesters a twin coronary. 

"I'm going to check around a bit more on my own,"  he announced, kissed Bobby on the cheek – which elicited a gagging noise from Dean - and vanished.


	8. Chapter 8

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Trust me on this one, okay? There's some dark things in this chapter (no pun, but the Darkness is with us) and also events which aren't quite as they appear. Sometimes memories aren't reliable. Dean comes over as a complete jerk in some of it but again...trust me. I wasn't sure about whether to keep some of this detail but the story's not right without it. I decided I had better up the rating anyway just in case.

Crowley arrived back hours later, after Bobby had gone to bed but not to sleep.  The hunter felt a sudden weight on the side of the bed and rolled, reaching for the pistol he had placed on the bedside table.  "Ah, ah, it's me!" came the gravelly British voice he knew, and Bobby subsided, muttering.

"Good way to get shot,"  he growled, his hand encountering a heavy woollen coat whose outer material was chilled and dusted with melting snow.  The ceiling light clicked on of itself and he saw Crowley on his feet, grinning as he pulled off the coat and started on his tie.

"Where've you been?"  Bobby asked, brushing a hand against Crowley's sleeve, which was icy.

"All over,"  Crowley said, which was hardly an answer.  He continued to strip, methodically folding and placing his clothing, then dived neatly under the covers, making Bobby yell as Crowley's chilled feet came into contact with his body.  "Ah, that's better, love, you're nice and warm,"  the demon said contentedly, pressing against him. 

"I _was_ ,"  Bobby grumbled, but he reached his arms around Crowley and hugged him close.  "Why do you and Cas have to scare the shit out of us the way you do?  Why can't you zap into the corridor and use the door like a normal person?"

"I'm a supernatural entity, darling,"  Crowley said chidingly.  "Also it's funny."  He sighed then, as though the flirting was only the surface and there was something lonely and bleak beneath it.  Bobby petted him, running a hand along his shoulder and back.

"It's okay,"  he soothed.  He determined he would not ask Crowley for news, not yet.  He wasn't going to be one of the many people who valued Crowley only for what he could do for them, the way the boys often did.  "I'm glad you're okay.  Couldn't get to sleep till I knew you were all right."

Crowley hesitated and Bobby could sense his surprise, though he couldn't see Crowley's expression with the way he was lying against him.  Bobby kept petting him, enjoying the contact as much as Crowley seemed to be and purposefully _not_ asking him surely people had been concerned for him before.  Like as not they hadn't, and that was an ache in his own heart.  What chance had Crowley ever had, not to become what he had been?  What he still was, for the most part. 

"Now you're done freezing me, I reckon I might get some sleep,"  he told the demon, yawning for real. 

"You're a true romantic, love."

"When I've had some rest,"  Bobby said sternly and Crowley chuckled.  The light went out, throwing them back into darkness, but this dark was almost comforting for Bobby.  One demon changes everything, he thought wryly, with his arms around Crowley, who had relaxed as though he too planned to sleep.  Whatever's going down, in hell or above it, I'm keeping him.  He thought the words defiantly in the direction of Crowley's realm, which _would_ lose its King, if he had any say in the matter.

_When we do get some sleep, it isn't rest._

*        *        *

The King of Hell slept.

He was not aware of it, perhaps even more so than usual sleepers, because demons did not need to sleep unless they were cut off from their source of energy;  Hell itself.  Their King could command the power of all the damned souls at once, if he so desired.  Nevertheless, he wandered in dream.

_It was the bed upstairs in the sleazy hotel Dean was so fond of, one of so many in their riotous travels.  Being a demon himself now, the Knight didn't need the bed for rest any more than Crowley did, but he certainly needed it for other things.  Quite a few other things, such as the three giggling "sisters" he had drunkenly shepherded upstairs after the bar finally closed for the night.  They were triplets, they had solemnly assured Dean, and Crowley, who had leaned a hand on his Knight's shoulder as he surveyed the latest talent._

_They did look alike, he supposed now; at least the brassy blonde of their hair probably came out of the same bottle, and their double-Ds spilling out of flimsy tops were probably courtesy of the same plastic surgeon.  As Crowley looked in, he saw Dean straddling one of the girls, almost too drunk to complete his motions, while the other two pressed close on either side.  One saw Crowley and beckoned to him, giggling, and when Dean saw him, he joined in.  "Sure, come on,"  he called.  "Girls, this here is the King of Hell come to check you all out!"_

_Crowley had stripped, grinning, before he joined the other four on the bed, and soon was most intensely entwined with the nearest of the triplets, but it was Dean he watched.  At some point the lights were turned off and the night became a blur of limbs and caresses and cries, no one trying too hard to track whose hands were going where.  Dean had tired at last and got rid of his company simply by pushing one of the girls out of the bed and drunkenly demanding that "everyone just go!"_

_Crowley_ _didn't even consider that his Knight could mean him.  Pleasantly exhausted, with scratch marks bleeding on his shoulders, he even closed his eyes for a few drifting minutes.  When he opened them a bit later, Dean was asleep on the other side of the bed, facing him.  A new demon, especially one created in such an unorthodox manner, outside of Hell, generally did take a little while shedding human needs such as sleep.  So Crowley could watch him, savouring the classic lines of his face, for if he wanted to see something, night was no impediment and the faint starlight was more than sufficient.  With his eyes closed and the fury of his being calmed, Dean looked like the young hunter he had been, the one Crowley had courted._

_Despite himself, he reached out a hand and lightly stroked Dean's dark hair back from his forehead.  During the orgy with the triplets, he had managed to touch Dean, sure that the Knight was unaware that the hand caressing him at one point had belonged to his King.  Crowley felt himself harden and wondered;  would his Knight be open to new experiences?  Certainly, if Crowley wanted him, he could have him.  That was a given.  But to have Dean want him would be more delicious yet.  His hand drifted over Dean's cheek and he felt a motion._

_"Hey,"  Dean slurred, still with his eyes closed, "you feeling me up, Crowley?  The triplets not enough for you?"_

_He was smiling.  Crowley caught his breath, anticipating, and began to slide his hand down to Dean's shoulder, lower yet.  Dean didn't move or object.  Crowley rolled over, closer to him, and Dean opened his eyes. They gleamed silver-black, the colours changing as Dean laughed, a low, mocking sound. Crowley's hand stopped its movement._

_"You think I didn't notice?"  Dean asked._

_"Notice what?"  Crowley prided himself that his voice was calm, indifferent._

_"That you didn't get it on with any of the girls.  All you really did was watch, my King.  You watched_ me _and that got you hard.  And now you're thinking you're gonna get me.....or maybe you're wanting me to take you?  That would be right."  Again a mocking chuckle.  "And you're not gonna do anything to me or say anything to your demons because that would let them know how pathetic you really are."_

_Dean turned away from him and got out of the bed in one smooth, pantherish movement.  "I'm going out.  You can stay here and ....imagine being the girl."_

_Then he was gone._

_Crowley_ _was in the bed alone, aching with need and shame._

_It was the first surety he had that Dean was not his and that he could not hold him.  In any way._

He woke with burning tears in his eyes, at first thinking it was that same night, still dark, after Dean had taunted him and left.  The following day, Dean had shoved him to the ground - _We're done! -_   and he had known he would have to return the Knight to his brother, for whatever good or ill Sam Winchester could do about it.  That moment of waking, when he had cried, had felt like all the loneliness and horror of his centuries in Hell had fallen on him at once.  He had known Dean was correct, that he would never tell any of his people or censure Dean in any way.

Then the confusion of unfamiliar sleep was gone and he knew it was not that night.  He had simply lived it again, what humans called a nightmare, and now he was awake, sweating like a terrified human, not knowing where he was or when.

"Hey, what's the matter?"  The deep rumbling voice beside him was as unlike Dean's as it could possibly be, and so was the way Bobby Singer awkwardly rubbed his shoulder and propped himself up next to him.  "You have a bad dream?  They're the goin' currency at the moment."  He shuddered a little beside Crowley.  "I was....back when my wife returned as a zombie.  I swear, I was right there.  I don't ever dream like that."

"I don't dream at all.  Or I didn't."  Crowley reached for him, for the moment fearing he _was_ still dreaming and that any moment Bobby's kind concern would melt into mocking laughter, echoing Dean's taunting words.  But Bobby held him firmly, stroking his back, and gradually the dream's torment dissolved and he was fully awake and relieved to be so.  Humans could keep the experience of sleep, as far as Crowley was concerned.

"Everyone's having bad dreams,"  Bobby murmured against his ear.  "I guess it goes with the territory."

"Or it _is_ the territory."

"What do you mean?"

"The Darkness.  Sounds like a nightmare to me.  Remember how I said those people – the townsfolk – seemed to be asleep while they were shuffling around?"

"You are creeping me out,"  Bobby muttered.  "Jody was complaining about nightmares...and she wouldn't normally bother with stuff like that.  So what did you dream about?  I told you mine."

"It's not important."

"Like hell it's not,"  Bobby said, still gently, but his hand on Crowley's back stilled.  "Do demons usually have nightmares?"

"No.  By the time we're transformed, we know that reality is worse."

Bobby didn't really want to think too hard about that.  He couldn't see Crowley properly in the dark, but the guy had been moaning and shaking and as the boys would say, not in a good way.  Talking about feelings definitely wasn't _his_ favourite thing, but he had a hunch the dreams were important and in his business, you paid attention to hunches.  They could keep you alive.  "So did you dream about something real?  That started off real and then kinda twisted so it was way worse?"

"No,"  Crowley said softly.  "It was a recreation."

"Come on,"  Bobby said.  "Tell me."

Finally, curled against him in the dark, Crowley did and Bobby listened with growing dismay.  "I don't get it,"  he said when Crowley was done.  "The homophobic thing, I mean.  You say Dean did pretty much what he wanted after he was, uh, demonised and went with you?"  Crowley made a sound which could have been agreement.  "So he invited you into the uh, well, you know, the thing with the girls?"

Crowley frowned, finding the memories vaguer than they should have been.  He just didn't forget things;  it went with the demonic territory.  "He was very drunk, but yes, I'm sure he did."

"A guy who's homophobic wouldn't do that, even if he was blind drunk,"  Bobby insisted.

Crowley laughed a little, but the dream beat at him; the contempt in Dean's face and his words, mirroring the disgust folk had had for Fergus McLeod, far gone in drink and falling over in the street.  There were times he would have done anything for another drink.  His present situation attested to that. 

"Dean doesn't still feel like that about you,"  Bobby assured him.  "He and Sam don't trust you, but you have to admit they got reason for that.  They aren't gonna hurt you."

"Not while they need me, at least,"  Crowley agreed.  He thought about what time it was and knew; a trick so effortless he tended to forget humans couldn't do it.  Just past three in the morning.  Outside the bunker, their part of the world was in winter and the inhabitants of Lebanon wandered mindlessly, moaning in their dreams.  _Sleepwalkers_ , he thought, _not zombies.  They aren't dead._  He could sense the life in them, though their minds were fractured, and his lone patrol had netted him the confirmation he had needed.  "I don't know why you bother with me, Robert,"  he said.

"Back at you," the hunter murmured.  "You could have anybody you wanted.  Plenty of people would want you."

"They might want the King of Hell, love; what I could give them, but me?  I don't think so."

"Crap.  Jody liked you – before she knew who or what you were.  You burned a hell of a bridge there, no pun intended."

Crowley raised his brows and nodded slightly;  that was correct.  Jody had indeed seemed to like "Roderick," at least on a surface level.

"Or you don't actually like women?"  Bobby questioned.  "Funny I never thought to ask you that, considerin'."

Crowley gave a genuine chuckle, looked over at Bobby lying beside him, quite bare now, and himself, the same.  Bobby probably didn't have any idea how well he could see in the dark.  Fair question, though; in his centuries he had tried out most of the known variations and invented a few himself.  "Robert Singer; are you trying to get me to say you're the only man for me?"

Bobby felt himself blush.  He did that way too easily;  curse of his fair colouring, he thought. "You've been around since sixteen-whatever-it-is.  Like I'd matter against all of that."  He let Crowley go, making a business of settling himself in bed in the darkness, his back to Crowley now.  "Not what I meant at all."  He didn't know why Crowley's flirting manner hurt him, of a sudden, didn't want to discuss it either.

A moment later, he felt Crowley's hand lightly grasp his shoulder.  "Robert?"

He grunted something inarticulate.

"I've had more lovers than I can count...since I became King of the Crossroads...then King of Hell," said that soft, drawling voice from beside him.  "If you can use that word.  There's no love in Hell.  Only lust and desire that's never satisfied.  So I can't really tell you whether I fit the categories humans make.  Men, women, lamia, demons."  His cheek pressed against Bobby's back.  "As much as I can understand it...I love you.  I'd love you whatever gender you were.  Don't shut me out, Robert.  Please don't."  His voice broke a little.  He coughed to hide it.  "For you, I could wish to be human again."

"Hell, Crowley."  Bobby coughed as he turned about in the bed, pulling Crowley into his arms.  "I'm just grumpy at you because I wanted you to be serious and you were bein' you."

Crowley laughed a little, relieved.  "I suppose that's right, love.  But do you understand me?"  He took Bobby's hand in his and tapped his own chest with it.  "This is a vessel.  I have worn vessels for the past three centuries.  Whatever mattered to me when I was human is _gone_.  Fergus McLeod married and had a son; he was, in the current parlance, a straight man.  He was also a worthless piece of shit, making what emerged from the torturers in Hell almost an improvement.  And yes, I use the third person because Fergus isn't me.  I'm..."  He hesitated.  "I'm Crowley and I love you, Robert.  I do."

Bobby couldn't think of anything to say to that, except what he needed to.  He shifted closer and his hand traced the side of Crowley's face, his beard and then his lips.  He leaned down and kissed him softly, completely.  "I love you,"  he mumbled.  "I don't know where we're goin' or where we'll end up, but I want you with me."

Crowley responded to the kiss and it was some time before either felt like speaking again.  Crowley ended up propped on Bobby's chest, the hunter stroking his hair while the demon king told him, in his soft, drawling accent, just what he had found when he went searching the world.

"There's no one in charge out there.  No governments, no soldiers.  I saw a lot of soldiers shambling around with the rest.  Some bitten.  Limbs missing, moaning, the works.  Went to Washington DC;  nobody home there now, love.  Over the pond to check the old homeland;  same story, different zombies.  Europe, Asia, the space station..."  Crowley grimaced.  "That was different."

"What about survivors?"

"Some.  A few, barricading themselves into places or going crazy with all the ammunition.  Same story; they saw most of the people around them turn.  Not all of 'em violent, some like the ones we saw here, just shambling sleepwalkers, but I'd say they were desperate to wake up and can't.  Not even being shot does it."

"Any constant?  I mean, anything different about the survivors that was the same for all of them?"

"Don't know yet, love, I didn't get down to that much detail.  But you may like to know one detail;  the zombies know you're here."

"Say again?"

"They know you're here.  They've wandered in from all over and are surrounding the bunker like seagulls around a plate of chips."

"Great.  But you can do your thing..."

"I don't think you and your boys want to be solely dependent on me and my 'demon cab,' "  Crowley warned.  "Or even on Feathers if he shows up here again.  You want my advice?"

"Go ahead,"  Bobby sighed.

"You need to meet up with your sheriff and all the available brains need to go to work or _your species is done_."  He spoke the last four words very slowly and grimly.  "I will do what I can but I must return to Hell or lose control, very soon.  When your boys are out of bed, you'd better have another little confab.  I'll disappear because I don't think they want me there when they're planning – serious lack of trust there – and be back in a few hours, your time."

"You're going now?  You just got back."

"To see you.  Do you plan on doing anything more interesting than lying there and snoring for the next few hours?"

"Well, no..."

"There, then."  He patted Bobby's chest and abruptly was gone.  Bobby muttered to himself, then pulled the blankets up and settled down;  might as well rest while he could.


	9. Chapter 9

"No, Crowley's gone again,"  Bobby told Sam and Dean in the institution-sized kitchen.  "He was only back for a coupla hours, but he said everything's broken down in the cities he visited.  Rescue's not coming, by the sounds of things.  And no, I don't know what he's up to now, but he was pretty adamant that we needed to meet up with Jody and her lot if we wanted to make any difference."

Dean put a mug of coffee at Bobby's elbow and a plate of toast on the table.  He was still having breakfast himself;  Sam having finished.  The younger hunter muttered something about making sure the guns were ready and left, leaving Bobby chewing toast and thoughtfully regarding his surrogate son across the table.  He knew what he wanted to ask, but damn it, finding the words was going to be a hassle.

"Got to ask you something, Dean, and I don't rightly know how to start."

Dean shrugged and reached for his coffee.  "Straight out like always,"  he suggested.  "You always did tell it like it is."

"Yeah, I guess.  And that's _do_ tell it, Dean.  I'm not the past tense any more."

"Sorry.  What do you want to know?"

"Crowley had a nightmare – no, don't say anythin' clever about that.  Not surprising we're getting them, given what we've been through and what's happening, but with him I was pretty surprised, given what his life's like as a demon.  I know you know about that."  A short, unhappy nod from Dean.  "I mean in Hell, the torturing side of things, what they go through to become what they are.  Sam rolled that back aways, with him.  Even though he didn't complete the trial to turn Crowley human, he did something, made Crowley more human than he was.  Else I...."  Bobby cleared his throat and wondered whether he would be able to get the rest of the words out.  "Else I couldn't be with him."

A look of horror crossed Dean's face.  "Bobby, you are not going to ask me for advice on your love life with the King of Hell!"

Bobby grimaced, feeling the heat in his face and hoping his beard would hide some of the blushing.  "No.  I'm gonna ask you about yours."

Dean shoved his chair back from the table and seemed about to flee.  Bobby held out a conciliating hand.  "Please.  I got a point here.  Something about his dream that didn't seem right when he told me.  I know you were there for what he was dreamin' about and I need to know your side of it."

"If Sam comes back in, we're talking about zombie movies,"  Dean warned.

"Agreed.  Okay.  He was dreamin' about some, uh, event with three girls who were supposed to be triplets.  You were with 'em and he came into the room.  What happened after that?"

Dean's account, though confused, matched pretty well with what Crowley had said, up to the point where Dean had drunkenly kicked the girls out so he could get some sleep.  "I mean, there was nothing left,"  Dean said with a trace of a grin. 

"Thanks for that detail.  Okay.  So Crowley was still there."

"Yeah.  He was pretty worn out and looked like he was just gonna go to sleep, even though demons aren't supposed to need to.  I didn't care.  I just hit the light and I was gone."

"Anything happen between you and him?  Come on, Dean, this is important.  Given what you know about me and Crowley, you think I'd care if you liked guys as well as girls?"

"Uh."  Dean rubbed his eyes, drank some more coffee and looked around for another reason to delay.  There was nothing except the washing up, so he looked reluctantly back at Bobby.  "Okay.  But I was drunk."

"They're gonna put that on your tombstone if you're ever lucky enough to have one.  Go on."

"He, well, he kind of made moves,"  Dean muttered. "I'm not going to give you a blow by blow...and _no_ , that's not what I mean."

"Okay, okay."  Bobby thought he was probably as shifty-eyed as Dean by this time and besides, he really didn't want to know that much detail.  "So stuff, uh, happened and you were okay with it?"

"Yes."  Dean sighed.  "Probably why I was such a shit to him later on, knocking him on his ass in front of his demons.  I don't know why he didn't fry me, but he let me go."

"He likes you, Dean,"  Bobby said heavily.  "Sometimes I wonder why, too, but he likes you.  And Sam, which makes even less sense.  Point is; you didn't go all homophobe on him when he moved on you?"

"No,"  Dean admitted. "Does he say I did?"

"Not exactly.  He dreamed that you did and he woke up believing it."

"He what?"

"Calm down.  Even he admits it doesn't make sense, when we talked about it.  He's not mad, just upset and confused as hell."

Sam wandered back in, cleaning a Glock pistol, and looked curiously from one to the other.  "Who's confused?"

"The zombie in _Dawn of the Dead_ who remembers how to pick up a rifle,"  Dean said smoothly.  "I keep telling Bobby that's not what we're dealing with here."

"I sure hope not,"  Sam said.  "So are we going to wait for Crowley to get back from wherever before we move out?"

"We'll have to,"  Bobby said, remembering that other detail.  "He said we're surrounded by the good folk of Lebanon, who're apparently all around the bunker waiting for dinner to be served.  Or else maybe you can get Cas to do pick up?"

"I don't like to take him away from Jody and the girls,"  Sam said.  "He's probably the main reason they're still okay.  Have you called Jody yet?  Might help her if we let her know we're on our way."

"Not yet," said Dean and Bobby got up.

"I'm gonna organise my stuff,"  he said vaguely.  Sam and Dean had to know that was going to take him about three minutes but they let him go.  He had had all the family togetherness he wanted for one day.  The one person he wanted wasn't available.

Sam looked into his room a short while later, finding Bobby lying on his bed reading; a packed duffel bag nearby on the floor.  "Hey, Bobby."

"Hey.  How's Jody?"

"They've had some trouble,"  Sam said grimly.  "Some of her people missing on a supply run, including Donna and Alex.  Cas went searching for them and he's not answering calls.  So we're going to head over there now.  I know what you said about the zombies up top, but we need the car and Dean figures we can bust through them.  Might be a plan if you come with us."

"I'm gonna wait for Crowley.  He doesn't know where Jody and them are and no, leavin' him a note won't work either."

"Come on, Bobby, he could find us, or rather you, even if you just went off without a word,"  Sam said, a note of impatience in his voice.

"Maybe he could but I'm waitin' for him,"  Bobby repeated. "Any more outside news, like reports on the tv or the Net?"

"Looks like the whole world is rioting,"  Sam said.  "I don't know how we're going to fix this one, Bobby."

"It's not all on you, is it?"

"It kind of is."

"No,"  Bobby growled and Sam actually took a step back, all six foot five muscle, as though he thought Bobby would attack him.  "Whose word have you got for that?  Death, or Death's puppet.  Dean didn't kill Death, Sam, that's just stupid."

"But that's when the Mark disappeared,"  Sam said doggedly.  "Right after that, there was all that weird stuff with the black smoke coming out of the ground and us nearly getting buried in the car.  Though Dean reckoned if he had to go, he wanted to be in Baby's driver's seat."

Bobby grimaced.  "Thanks for sharing, Sam.  All I'm saying is there could be a lot of things behind this and though you and Dean are good hunters, trained by the best, after all, you're taking a lot on yourselves to think you could wreck the world."

Sam shrugged as though he'd said what he could say and that was all.  "Okay, Bobby.  We'll call when we're on the road, and you let us know how you're doing, until Crowley comes back.  Or you could call him.  He says there's great reception in Hell."

*        *        *

It got way too quiet way too fast.

Bobby Singer settled in a corner of the library, an alcove with a comfortable seat and a table on which to put his drinks and a plate.  He was armed, of course, in both mundane and supernatural weaponry, but he hadn't done his usual salt circle/devil's trap routine.  That was kind of a problem when you were waiting for the King of Hell to show up and you wanted him to.

He didn't want to go to sleep.  He'd slept well enough, in the end, last night and it was only early evening now.  Already dark, though.  Sam had called him as soon as the sound of the Impala's engine faded from where Bobby had stood by the door, with it cracked open.  They had been going to call again when they met up with Jody, but that hadn't happened yet.  Bobby was sure they must've made it to Sioux Falls, but then again, he didn't know what obstacles there might be on the roads now.  Sleep was too much of a risk.

From here he could see down to the lower level of the war room, and over to the stairs that led up to the landing, and the front door.  The soundproofing was such that he couldn't hear the moaning of the creatures outside.  Sam had said there were dozens of them; the former citizens of the town, drawn somehow to the last place with unchanged humans in it.  Or were they drawn to something else?  Bobby sighed, his mind restlessly returning to the questions they were dealing with.  Before Dean had snapped and taken off, Bobby had wondered whether they couldn't do some sort of exchange between Crowley and Dean?  Would Crowley even have noticed any change if he had taken the mark himself?

Bobby had wondered whether it would simply dissipate if it went to the King of Hell.  All that about Cain bein' a demon, well, he hadn't been one when he got the Mark.  Then after he passed the Mark to Dean, he returned to his demonic ways anyway.  But now, seems that at least that problem had gone away, but Bobby was finding it hard to believe.  It wasn't visible on Dean's arm and Death's avatar had crumbled into nothing, but you couldn't kill Death.  Bobby was willing to bet his hope of Heaven – not that that was such a thing now – that the most senior of Death's reapers had found himself suddenly holding a scythe.

For a moment, though, the order of things had been jolted in a cosmic sense, and that microsecond of unmaking had opened a way for this thing, this Darkness, to cross.

"Bobby?  Where are you?"

Bobby froze, forgetting what he'd been pondering.  The voice was clear and familiar and beloved, and it was pitched to carry over a distance.  He was on his feet before he knew it, trying to see where the speaker was, but there was nothing.  She was outside, of course he couldn't see her.  "Karen?"  he whispered.

"Bobby!  I don't know what's going on, but I'm out here in this freezing night and I can't remember how I got here."

"Where were you?  You weren't in Heaven or you'd have found me...I'd have found you!"  He took several steps towards the stairs down to the War Room.  He knew, because Castiel had awkwardly but gently told him, that Karen had died as an undead, a monster, and the damned system set up by God, working on automatic now that He was gone, had placed her in Purgatory.  After a time, she would have dissipated into nothingness and her spark, her soul, placed in another being.

He hadn't found her there, on his own visit, already a spirit after Sam rescued him from Hell.  But then, Bobby supposed unhappily, things had already gone way too skew for side trips.  Part of him wanted to rush to the door and find Karen, but the deep caution of his hunting life made him wait, and question. 

"Bobby – I can't think, I don't know why you're asking me these things and not helping me."  She was sobbing now, a heartbreaking sound, as clear as though she was inside with him, making him turn around, trying to locate the source of the voice.  "There are these _things_ out here and they're coming towards me.  Please hurry."

That was it.  He was here, wasn't he?  Couldn't something, some power, have rescued the wife he'd failed twice already?  No way was he going to make it a third time.  Bobby Singer hurried down the steps, across the War Room and up again to the door.  For some reason he couldn't turn his mind back to weapons left lying on the table and why it might not....be a good idea...to open that door.

The wind smelled of ash.  It was pretty damn cold for there to be a fire, but always possible....why couldn't he think properly?  Bobby opened the door enough to step outside, instantly feeling the icy wind on his face and cutting through his clothing.  No lights outside and the sky must be overcast;  he couldn't see any stars and the world beyond the light from the doorway was a dark blur of nothing.  Where was Karen?  He couldn't see anyone or anything now and for him to hear the voice, she had to have been pretty close.

A smell of rot drifted to him and he turned, gagging as the smell grew much stronger.  There, barely a hand's reach from him, were maybe twenty, thirty people, moaning mindlessly as they closed.  Why hadn't he seen them?  He had looked around, hadn't he, searching for her....Somehow a group of the zombied people had got between him and the doorway.  Bobby didn't remember taking any steps but he was further out into the car lot, fumbling in his pocket for some weapon, his knife, at least.  He couldn't find anything.  Then the wind blew icy gusts into his face and Bobby Singer was abruptly fully awake.

He feinted at the zombies, making a noise somewhere between a growl and a shout, hoping to make a gap he could get through, back _inside_ ,  god, why was he out here?  But these creatures made no response, not even a start.  He couldn't see their faces clearly as they blocked the light, more of them stumbling into the doorway and into the bunker, gods, no.  With no choice, Bobby dodged away, his limbs feeling heavy and unresponsive, even as his mind woke up to the realisation that he had been tricked. 

He thudded right into something.  Someone.  He let out a cry of shock;  he hadn't been able to see far but the zombies had been gathered all together in a semicircle near the doorway.  His instincts had led him to the gap they'd left, the knowledge that his only hope was to get well into the open, out on the road.  He spun around, ready to kick at it, but the shape there didn't stink of rot and looked, well, like a person.

"I'm not here to harm you, brother,"  a man's voice said, bearing with it the drawling cadence of Louisiana.  He had his hands out, weaponless, but Bobby was too old a hand to believe that.  Some creatures came equipped with their own natural weapons and that voice...he knew that voice from somewhere and it didn't encourage trust in him.  "I'm a friend of Dean Winchester's."  That _did_ ease his fast-beating heart a little.  Bobby coughed and nodded.  "Is he here somewhere?"

"No....I'm on my own and somethin' – this voice got me to come outside."  That sounded so stupid Bobby wanted to dig his own grave right here and crawl inside.  Just for a minute.  He wondered why the zombies weren't chasing him.  They had, they had started to shuffle towards him again but now they seemed to have lost interest and were turning again to the light in the doorway.  Despairing, Bobby watched several stumble through.  Probably falling right down the steps but that wasn't going to help him. "If I can get to my weapons, I can deal with 'em;  can you help me?"

The man laughed, then raised his hands again placatingly.  "Sorry, brother, I didn't mean to make fun.  If I deal with these for you;  will you allow me to come inside and wait for Dean?"

"Dean's somewhere else,"  Bobby said.  "I'm waitin' for somebody to get back here, then we're goin' to join Dean and the rest.  If you can clear the way, well, sure, you can come with us.  By the way, don't I know you from somewhere?  What's your name?  I'm Bobby Singer."

"Pleased to see you again, Bobby Singer.  I'm Benny Lafitte."


	10. Chapter 10

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is a bit long but I couldn't find a suitable part to break it up. This thing has taken on a life of its own :-) As always, comments welcome!
> 
> ***************************************************************************

 

Before Bobby could say or do anything, the man blurred into motion, right into the pack of zombies milling around the open doorway.  They fell like mannequins, pieces torn off them, and Benny was gone through the doorway in search of those which had gotten inside.  Barely five minutes later, Bobby was alone in the chilly dark and Benny called out to him.  "I'm done here, friend, you can come in.  I recommend you don't stay out there."

"Don't need any more telling,"  Bobby grumbled back and quickly headed in, closing the door behind him.  Below on the War Room's floor were the spilled and broken bodies of the zombied people and the man, wearing a long coat over a shirt and trousers totally inadequate for the weather, looking up at him.  Even if the name hadn't jogged his memory, he could see the fangs now, fully lowered and bloody.

"You were in Purgatory,"  Bobby said softly, not moving towards the steps.  "Dean's friend, his _vampire_ friend...."  He struggled to remember thoughts, events from a time beyond his physical life.  Things a human brain wasn't set to remember.  Flashes of an endless forest beneath an overcast, sunless sky, a perpetual twilight. "So you – Sam brought you back same way he brought me?"

"No,"  Benny said, appearing to search for words.  He took a dark kerchief from his pocket and wiped his mouth.  When he took it away, his fangs were retracted once more.  Bobby was about to speak when a very human cry from beyond the door made him jump and gasp.  It was a woman's voice, but now no one would have mistaken it for Karen's, or even a normal human woman's.  It was a carrying shriek of rage and loss and Bobby winced and clapped hands over his ears.

"Banshee,"  Benny Lafitte said, matter-of-factly.  "She may have been working with a shifter, who could get inside your head and conjure the image of your wife.  Once they got you, banshee could have your spirit, your soul and the shifter your flesh."

"I was inside the wardings!"

"Doesn't matter now,"  the vampire disagreed.  He looked up at Bobby.  "You can come down here.  I won't hurt you and they won't try to come in while I'm here."

Whether he believed that or not, Bobby decided, he didn't have a lot of choice.  Talk about between a rock and a hard place;  if Benny Lafitte was correct and there was more than one monster beyond the door.  He slowly descended, feeling aches everywhere.

"I need a drink,"  he muttered and made for the kitchen.  "Can you drink beer?"

"I can.  Thank you."

They sat drinking the beers, the hunter and the vampire, with the library of ancient lore around them.  Bobby studied Benny Lafitte thoughtfully.  His clothing was in bad shape, dirty and torn in parts, and he hadn't had a decent wash in a long time.  His hair and beard looked like those of some bum on the streets, but he looked tough and strong.  His blue gaze was steady and clear as he returned Bobby's look.

"What did you mean Sam didn't bring you back?"  the hunter asked at last, as Benny drained the can he was holding.  "That don't make sense."

"You're a hunter, aren't you?"  Benny asked in return.

"I know about your kind of creature and a whole lot more, yeah.  I practically raised Sam and Dean."

Benny nodded.  "I didn't come back with Sam,"  he said quietly.  "Like I told him, I was no good up here.  I tried not to hurt people, but all the time I was so damn hungry."  He looked into some distance Bobby could not see.  "So I stayed behind in that forest and I guess time passed, though it's hard to tell there.  I moved along, always on the move.  Sometimes the other monsters would catch me and kill me and I'd wake up on the forest floor and get up again.  Then one time found myself lying there but I didn't remember any fight, any kill.  I got up and I kept moving along and the forest changed.  I came to a road with the white lines on it and I followed it.  I couldn't see any stars, that's like Purgatory, but there are no roads, no dwellings.  I followed along for a long time.  Sun rose a few times and I had to hide.  It doesn't kill me but it hurts bad.  Then when dark came – and it seemed to come faster than I remembered of the world – I came out from my cover and I followed the road.  There were wrecked cars and I found mobs of people, only they were like the ones here.  I went by them and some time later I found a mob moving on the road and I followed them to see where they were headed, if anywhere, and I came to this place."

"It's where Sam and Dean stay,"  Bobby said.  "I don't know much about it because I was dead when they found it, but it's a hideout of a secret group called the Men of Letters.  They gathered lore about creatures, they didn't just hunt 'em.  Kind of looked down on hunters, from what I can work out, but the boys' grandfather was a member, so they've got as much right to the place as anyone.  But they're gone to Sioux Falls to help out a friend of ours and her group."

"What happened?" Benny asked.  "If anyone knows what happened, the Winchesters would."

"Well, yeah, because they're kind of responsible for it,"  Bobby grumbled.  "It's a long story.  Want another beer?"

He told Benny, for he could see no reason not to, about Sam and Dean's recent fortunes, including the Mark of Cain and how Dean's apparent killing of Death had wiped the thing from his arm.  "Can't be sure of any of it,"  Bobby finished up moodily.  "I swear the boys make up this shit as they go along.  They should be writing some of the damn lore but they don't record a thing, far as I know."  He looked over at a clock, some damn ornate thing that had probably been ticking along for a hundred years.  Close on midnight, but he didn't want to sleep, not any more.  Not with a vampire there, however friendly he might act, and Bobby had to admit that killing a couple of dozen zombies for him was pretty friendly.

"Do you think your friend is in trouble?"  Benny asked.  He had nodded thoughtfully when Bobby finished his story but made no other comment.

"Hope not,"  Bobby thought, thinking of all that could befall a demon in his realm where a lot of creatures didn't like him.  "We didn't set a time or anything since we didn't know how long what he's doin' could take."  He thought it might be time to switch to coffee.

If Benny was curious, he didn't show it.  He nodded when Bobby offered coffee, but didn't follow him into the kitchen.  Just in case, Bobby opened the fridge Sam and Dean most often used, for ingredients in spells as well as food.  Crowley's blood junkie phase hadn't been that long ago, by all accounts, so just maybe...and there it was, a nondescript cooler at the back.  Bobby took the lid off and sniffed warily at the thermos inside, then grimaced.  This was probably the rotgut of blood; way too cold and kept way too long.  He shrugged, took the cap off and set the thermos into the microwave, trying to hold his breath.  He might be way too familiar with the way blood smelled but that didn't mean he was ever going to like it...

"Is that..."   Benny was right behind him and Bobby cursed.  "Sorry, brother, but I could smell that..."

"Yeah.  The boys keep some weird stuff around, so I checked."

Benny's hand shot out to halt the microwave and pull the door open.  He grabbed the thermos, which had to be hot, and promptly chugged the contents like one starving.  Which, Bobby thought uneasily, he could well be.  You didn't eat or drink in Purgatory;  you stayed in the state you had been when you were thrown in there, but Benny had by his own account been out for a couple of days and nights.

Benny set the empty thermos down and paused for a moment.  "Thank you,"  he murmured.  "I could have waited, I would have, but that has helped more than I can say."

Bobby busied himself with the coffee and handed the vampire a mug when it was done; black, no sugar.  They moved back to the armchairs in the library.

"Now your story, friend,"  Benny said quietly, when Bobby had settled himself.

"Huh?"

"You said that you had been dead.  For a human that's generally the end, unless they are turned into one of my kind.  Of course you don't have to tell me anything, but unless it's a secret..."

"Don't figure you for a blabberer,"  Bobby sighed.  "Though when we move on, I'd appreciate it if you didn't, you know, spread it around.  I'm gonna tell our friends, but probably not right away."

Benny nodded. 

"I was in Heaven but I don't remember it too well.  I try to think about specifics and I can't, it's like I was dreaming.  I know I died;  a Leviathan shot me."

"You were lucky, brother,"  Benny said quietly.

Bobby grimaced.  "You could say.  I know I'm telling this all wrong, but I still can't get my head around it.   I'm givin' you the quick version.  That was two years ago but I wasn't aware of time.  It didn't matter to me.  Then Castiel – you know about Castiel?"  A slight nod of the vampire's head.  Of course he did, Bobby thought.  Dean had probably bent his ear constantly on the subject of Cas while roaming Purgatory with Benny.  "Well, he came to me and asked whether I'd consider coming back....to help somebody who was....goin' off the rails, I guess you would say.  Some pretty damn crucial rails.  Somebody he thought would listen to me.  So I've been back here just over a month....feels like years, when my time in Heaven feels like a good night's sleep.  I got a few weeks back here and then the world falls apart."  Bobby shrugged.

"This must be someone very important,"  Benny said softly.  "And important to you."

"Yeah."

"This is the one you're waiting for now?"

Bobby nodded.  He had meant to leave it there, wanted to leave it there, but Crowley was going to show up and Benny would probably know what he was, even if Crowley didn't just tell him, which was just as likely.  "Might as well tell you,"  he muttered, avoiding the vampire's gaze.  "You're gonna know soon anyhow.  His name is Crowley and he's the King of Hell."

That got a silence long enough to make the hunter look reluctantly back at Benny, who was shaking his head.  "A _demon_?  An angel sent you back here to help a _demon_?"

"You gonna get all racist on the subject now, vampire?"

Benny smiled.  "I have met a few demons in Purgatory and they weren't my friends, brother."

"Don't expect they would be, but Crowley's different."

"I certainly am."

Bobby jumped, but at least had the gratification of seeing the vampire start as well and mutter something in Cajun French under his breath.  He turned his head to see Crowley standing by his chair, getting a whiff of his cologne blended with demonic sulphur.  Crowley was something of a mess.  His suit was covered with stuff Bobby's mind sheered away from identifying, but bodily fluids and blood and bits of flesh were a possibility.  He also looked exhausted, despite the quip.  Bobby got stiffly to his feet.  He had a moment to think _this Benny Lafitte is right there watching, am I really gonna...?_ before he told himself not to be an idjit and took Crowley in his arms.

The intense relief he sensed from Crowley, as the demon hugged him tightly, made him feel a whole lot better.  Crowley pressed his face against Bobby's neck and breathed deeply, in a sort of jagged gasp.  "Are you okay?"  Bobby asked, patting his back, searching for injuries.

"Nothing broken, but I'm not sure I would classify my current state as "okay," "  Crowley said.  "Maybe you'd introduce me to your friend?"

"Friend of Dean's,"  Bobby muttered.  "And he's got a hell of a story to tell you, maybe as good as yours."  He kept one arm around Crowley but shifted to face Benny, who had stayed seated but now got to his feet.  "Benny, this is Crowley, King of Hell.  Crowley, Benny Lafitte, late of Purgatory."

"Vampire?"  Crowley asked.

"Demon?"  Benny asked back, but he smiled, in a way that made Bobby like him.  Crowley smiled too, briefly.

"Come on,"  Bobby grumbled at him, "let's get you cleaned up.  Benny, make yourself at home, we'll be back soon."

As soon as they were – hopefully – out of the vampire's hearing, he asked, "Any news you got that can't wait a few minutes?"

Crowley seemed to think about that, then shook his head slowly. 

"Good, because you stink.  What's been going on?"

"Attempted murder, love.  Mine.  I walked right into an ambush, in my own Hell, no less."

"Again?"

"I know, it's very careless of me."

Bobby hauled him by way of their room, grabbed up some clothing more or less at random, collected a towel and headed on to one of the bunkers bathrooms, one with a tub.  Crowley sat on a bench and watched him with affectionate disbelief.  "I _could_ just zap myself clean, as you put it..."

"Not so sure you could, right now,"  the hunter murmured back, as he ran the water.  "Save the juice.  And get those clothes off.  Hold the comments for once, I'm too damn tired to go through all that.  Some crap happened while you were gone...basically something out there got to me, lured me out.  If Benny hadn't been there, I'd be dead.  He's here looking for Dean."

Crowley raised dark brows at him, but slowly stripped, dropping the clothes in a heap.  Bobby looked at him, wanting to make sure he was uninjured, but couldn't deny he enjoyed the looking.  Crowley's tattoos, bright dragons curling over his upper arms, chest and back, drew the eye and so did the demon king himself, compact and muscular despite some extra pudge around his middle.  Looking at a man this way, well, it wasn't what he was used to, but Bobby didn't try to deny it any more.  He grinned at Crowley's raised eyebrows and motioned at the tub.  "Go on, get in."

"Back in Hell, I have a claw-footed tub in the shape of a dragon, built of elegant white marble, a glass of wine at my hand and beautiful maidens to serve my every desire."

Bobby shrugged.  "Well, this tub is white, isn't it?  If you ignore the crusty yellow bits.  And you got me.  What are you complaining about?"

Crowley sank into the hot water with a sigh of relief, disappearing from view for a moment, then surging up again with a deep exhale.  He watched Bobby pull the wooden bench closer to sit on it, his ever-present cap skewed on his head.  "Nothing, love,"  he said softly.  "Never for a moment."

Bobby leaned close to the tub, resting his forearm on the side, as Crowley moved towards him.  "Heard Karen calling me,"  he said quietly.  "Don't know what went wrong in my head, but I just went, right out there with no weapons and a mob of zombies closin' in.  If Benny hadn't been there, I was a goner, sure enough.  He's not your average vampire.  So I reckon we keep an eye on him, but cut him some slack."

"Meaning we don't stake him right now?"

"Yeah."  Bobby leaned back and Crowley got down to the serious business of cleaning up, telling an account of maybe a dozen demons jumping him in the corridor, barely an hour after he had shown up.  He didn't know how he felt about Crowley's bloodthirstiness in sharing the details;  he was just intensely relieved the demon had got through it.  "So what's the situation in Hell?"  he asked.  "You still in charge?"

"Of course, love;  don't you have any faith in me?"

Bobby hmphed.  "Things aren't exactly settled anywhere right now.  Look, Benny'll tell you the story when we get back, but I want you to know the gist;  he says he _walked_ out of Purgatory.  That he was in the forest and came to a road – this road by the bunker – and followed a group of zombies here." 

Crowley washed his chest thoughtfully, Bobby watching the water glisten over the dragon tattoos.  The demon king glanced over at the hunter, saw his absorption and smiled. "You know, love, you could always use a bath yourself, having tangled with the zombies, as it were."

"Yeah,"  Bobby admitted wryly, looking at his damp and dirty clothing.  "But I also need to keep my mind on the job and you're bad for that.  When you're done, how about you go talk to Benny and I'll clean up, then we can decide when we're moving on."  He stood up, brushing his trousers.  "I'll go see what he's doin'."

What the vampire was doing was sitting in his armchair, reading.  He looked up as Bobby came in and indicated the book.  "I don't know when I last got a chance to read something.  I'm out of practice."

He was doing his best to be nonthreatening, Bobby guessed, which meant he was smart and, for a monster, thinking ahead.  All he'd seen of the guy was him fighting off other monsters who had attacked him and Sam in Purgatory and Benny's word that Dean had sent him.  Which meant; killed him.  This man had allowed Dean to do that and the possible reasons for that bothered the hell out of Bobby.  That story, whatever it was, had to wait, but there were still a few things he had to know before he took Benny among his friends.

"In Purgatory you don't need to eat, correct?"  Benny nodded.  "But here you do, I saw that.  How do you plan to deal with that?"

"I bought blood, before, "  the vampire said and Bobby had to laugh.

"You bought it?"

"Yes.  There are always people who will sell what others need."

"Yeah, I know there are, it just hit me funny, that's all."  Benny shrugged, not seeming to see the joke.  Bobby persevered.  "So you, uh, you don't get it straight from people?"

"Not for a long time,"  Benny answered softly.  "I won't harm you or any other human around you, if that's what you mean, and I see you do."  He looked past Bobby then and the hunter knew Crowley had come in.  He turned to see him, clean now but rather incongruously dressed in a too-large plaid shirt and jeans that he had had to roll up several times.

"Your turn, love,"  the demon said and Bobby nodded.

"Okay, thanks."  He headed out, not sorry to let Crowley take over.  He thought Benny seemed all right, but whether he was or not, he would not get the better of Crowley.  He didn't linger in the shower, much though he would have liked to, just got clean and then dressed before going to see whether the vampire and the demon were still playing nice.  He found them both in armchairs, apparently absorbed in reading; at least, nobody looked up at him until he sat down and cleared his throat.

"Benny, in a minute I'll show you where you can get cleaned up.  I'll get some of Dean's clothes for you.  But first I want to ask you; you run into any others of your old friends from Purgatory on your way here?"

"I saw monsters, if that's what you mean,"  Benny agreed.  "But we didn't all come out in the one spot;  if that had happened, there'd be wall to wall chaos goin' on here and there ain't."

"You see any Leviathan?"

"No, but I might not know one if I saw one, if they weren't..."  Benny mimed jaws opening, tapping his head.

"I think Purgatory has opened up,"  Crowley said, "and that the creatures within emerged where they died, or else somewhere of special significance to them.  I can't be sure of that last, but my demons report a sudden increase in the numbers of all kinds of supernatural creatures, wherever they were on Earth."

"We need to give the boys and Jody a heads up."

"We need to get there in person,"  the demon corrected.  "Forgiveness is always easier to obtain than permission;  haven't you heard that?"

"Tell me that again after Jody takes your head off."

"I'll win her around."

"Good luck with that."

Crowley gave him a withering look and Bobby grinned.

"I'll wait while you two get a room,"  Benny offered and two indignant male glares were turned on him.  "Aw, come on, it's obvious."

Bobby came back after setting Benny up with his shower and clean clothing.  He sank into a chair next to Crowley's with a sigh.  "I could sleep for a week."

"Next week, perhaps,"  Crowley murmured.  "I've thought of our next move."

"Do tell?"

"We'll offer to find Sheriff Mills' missing people for her and thus buy some acceptance for me and possibly for Benny.  By his account, he and Dean parted on good terms, if any parting involving a decapitation can be called good."

"I'd do that anyway,"  Bobby muttered.

"I know you would, darling, which is why I love you, but I have to think in deal terms, it's how I work.  They aren't going to accept me as any sort of buddy and they aren't going to accept the vampire either.  I want to get you there safely, pool our information and find a way to kick this thing's ass.  If the Darkness is in fact a thing, with an ass to kick."  He frowned thoughtfully.  "I really have spent too much time around you and the Winchesters."

"Not sorry,"  Bobby said.  "I mean, uh, I'm not sorry."

"No?'  Crowley asked softly.  "Nor am I."

Bobby reached out a hand and gripped Crowley's hand tightly.  Neither spoke, not needing to, for all of the ten minutes or so until they heard a quiet cough and looked up to see Benny, in one of Dean's plaid shirts and a pair of faded blue jeans, standing about two yards away.  Neither had noticed his approach.  "Thanks for that,"  the vampire said.  "Can't tell you how good hot water and clean clothes feel.  You decide what we're doin'?"

"We're going to meet up with Dean and Sam and some other people,"  Bobby said, glancing at Crowley, who nodded.  "You're gonna need to tell your story to 'em, same as you did us.  Then Crowley will tell 'em whatever he knows and me, the same."

"Sounds good,"  Benny said.  "I guess we need to go before another batch of them zombies shows up outside."

"Immaterial,"  Crowley scoffed.  He stood, still holding Bobby's hand, and held out his other for Benny, who looked at it in confusion.  "Come on, darling, don't be shy.  Weren't you ever taken out by a demon?"

"Crowley!"  Bobby growled.  "He can teleport,"  he explained to Benny.  "It just requires a touch but he likes stirrin' folks."  Benny thought about that, then shifted to place his hand on Bobby's shoulder.  "Smart move,"  Bobby commended.  "Stop pouting, Crowley."

"I am _not_ pouting."

"You . . . are so pouting,"  Bobby began his sentence in the bunker, Kansas, and ended it somewhere outside in the dark, Sioux Falls, South Dakota.  


	11. Chapter 11

Before the three travellers was the black bulk of a four storey building and the slip of icy gravel beneath their feet.  The air felt colder than it had in Kansas, if that was possible, and Bobby felt himself begin to shiver at once.  He started to ask Crowley if he could do anything about that, when a searchlight snapped on, aimed straight at their faces, and a young female voice ordered, "Hands up and don't move!"

"You want us to put our hands up before we don't move?"  Bobby asked.  He felt Benny release his shoulder.

"What?" said the person behind the searchlight.  Then, "Let go!"

The light was lowered and Bobby, blinking, saw Crowley standing right behind a slim blond girl.  He was holding the shotgun she had evidently been aiming in one hand, and had his other arm around the girl's shoulders to restrain her.  Before Bobby could tell him to let her go, the girl twisted and then let herself fall to the ground, one hand punching upwards where it would do the most good.  Crowley yelped in pain and shock and extended his hand, a mini-fireball erupting from nowhere over his palm.  Bobby managed to get to him, grabbing his hand and bellowing in his ear, "Stand _down!_ You want 'em to let us in, remember?"

A commotion behind the girl caught their attention and two more people appeared out of the flashlight's range, even as Bobby shouted, "I'm Bobby Singer!  Don't shoot!"

The blond girl scrambled away and stood, making for the safety of her companions.  One was Sheriff Jody Mills and the other was a stunned-looking Dean Winchester.

"Bobby?"  Jody managed.  "What on earth is going on?"

"Benny,"  Dean said, much quieter.  Confused, Jody watched him go forward to meet the stranger, who opened his arms and caught Dean in a fierce embrace.  She looked back at Bobby for an explanation;  he only shrugged at her.  Her look got grimmer as she recognised Crowley, still wincing and holding himself, his other hand still extended.

"What did he do to Claire?"

"I beg to differ,"  the demon managed, "on the subject of who did what to whom!"

"Well done,"  Jody told Claire, who smiled a little.  "You just belted the King of Hell in the nuts."

"Can we come inside?"  Bobby asked.  "We've got information you probably need to know and it is fricking cold."

Jody fell silent.  She looked at Dean, who slowly released Benny.  "You vouch for him?" she asked, nodding towards the latter.

"Yeah,"  Dean said, still looking half-dazed.  "And Bobby will keep an eye on Crowley, he..."

Crowley gripped Bobby's hand, holding to him as though the hunter was his lifeline.  "Let go of your damn balls, they're not made of crystal,"  Bobby hissed to him and Jody, startled, fought to hold back a grin despite the situation.  The teenaged girl giggled.  Jody looked at the man who had been her link to the Supernatural world, who had always had her back and she his, and saw the way he and Crowley linked their hands.

"Oh, you have got to be kidding,"  she said slowly.

"Jody, that's _not_ what you need to know..."  Bobby started, but the sheriff had already looked to Dean for confirmation and got a reluctant nod.

"Told you,"  Crowley whispered.

"Come inside,"  Jody said finally.  "We need to talk."

Bobby could now see that the entire lower floor of the building was barricaded, with anything the occupiers could find, by the look of it.  Lengths of corrugated iron and wood nailed over any windows.  Jody lithely climbed a folding ladder which had been extended down from the second storey.  Bobby muttered as he climbed after her – this was _not_ something he wanted to become a habit – but moved as swiftly as he could all the same.  Benny followed Dean and Crowley simply teleported inside, not bothering to assist anyone else.

The room Bobby climbed into had been cleared for easy access;  a bed and dresser pushed to the far side.  The teenaged girl climbed in after Jody and the two of them retracted the ladder, which folded into itself.  The only light in the room was a candle in a dish, throwing suitably eerie shadows against the walls.

Someone else came into the room and spoke to Jody as they made it inside; a thirtyish man wearing an army jacket and trousers, who did not seem curious about the newcomers, or at least didn't indicate such.  "Just keep an eye out from here,"  she said.  "No need to go back out.  They're not about or we would have had a herd of 'em attracted to the racket Claire and this lot made.  These are friends of mine from out of town."  She led the way out of the room and down a flight of stairs.  Sam appeared below them, looking at Bobby with an expression of relief.  Jody was still talking. "I take it you didn't arrive like normal people, since you've got a demon with you?"

"You could say that,"  Bobby answered.  Given that he was the only non-supernatural being of their trio, he seemed to be elected speaker.  "You got much of a zombie problem hereabouts?"

Jody regarded him suspiciously;  he _sounded_ serious but she was well acquainted with Bobby Singer.  Or had been, prior to what she'd been assured was his death.  "The zombies are the least of it,"  she said quietly.  "I've seen things I didn't believe in, even though I knew you."

"Right.  Where have Cas and your people got to?"

"They were headed for the station in Hibbing where Donna works; we made contact with a couple of people there who needed help.  Civilians.  I didn't want Alex to go but she snuck out after Donna.  Castiel wasn't initially with them;  he went looking when they failed to report."

"Who's Alex?"

"Teenaged girl,"  Dean said.  "Kidnapped by vampires as a child.  We rescued her."

"Cliffs notes,"  Bobby muttered.  "And this one?"

"Claire Novak,"  Dean said.  "Daughter of Jimmy Novak, Cas's, uh..."

"Vessel,"  Bobby said slowly, studying the girl with sympathy she plainly didn't want; she glared at him and turned away.  They were in an area Bobby recognised generally as being the lobby of a small hotel, though such didn't usually have boarded-up windows and a barricaded door.  Jody walked on into a common room with couches and seats arranged facing one another.  A few more candles sat in plates on low tables around the room, chasing shadows to the walls.  Jody sat on the nearest chair, stopping a yawn with difficulty, and the others settled themselves.  Bobby noted, though, that Dean touched Benny on the shoulder and the two of them spoke briefly to Jody and then left.

"What's this place?"  Bobby asked, when Jody turned to him again.  "Why aren't you at your station?"

"We were until yesterday,"  Jody said shortly.  "It was overrun.  Philip, the guy you saw upstairs is the proprietor of this place, a survivalist not-so-much-of-a-nut, as it turns out, and he's got the best weapons collection next to my station and a panic room we can use if it comes to it."

"You know a lot about him, considering he's a nut."

"We dated,"  Jody muttered.  "And that is so not the point.  Do you know anything about what happened?  There shouldn't _be_ anything that can shut an angel down, should there?"

"I wish there was more,"  Crowley murmured.  Without looking, Bobby elbowed him in the ribs and heard a satisfying and annoyed _oof_ in reply. 

"So where's the rest of your people?"  He looked around;  Jody, Sam, Claire, Crowley and himself.

"Well, you briefly met Philip when we came in,"  Jody said wearily.  "Three more people are getting their sleep now.  We did have a bunch of folks we rescued and brought in here, that decided to take their chance on the road, going to god knows where that won't be any safer when they get there.  Two others with Donna, Alex and Cas, if they're still alive.  Despite your welcome, Bobby, I _am_ glad to see you.  Dean vouches for his friend so he's all right.  And _you_."  Her gaze focused on Crowley like one of the big hunting cats.  "I am really pissed off that it would probably hurt Bobby's feelings if I killed you."

"Unfortunately it would,"  Crowley said.  "If you show me where this place is that they've gone to, I'll go and fetch them if there's anything to fetch, and fry the bones of whatever got in their way."

Demon and sheriff looked at one another and both nodded.  Crowley did not apologise, nor did Jody say anything about a levelling of the score, but Bobby thought the two understood one another.  Jody would know that he, Bobby, would not have anything to do with the person who had tried to kill her, if he was truly the same soulless being he had been back then.  And Crowley was asking for forgiveness in the only way he could.

Bobby was so weary he felt he could lie down and sleep where he was, but he went to Crowley, touching his shoulder to draw him aside.  "You're gonna go now?"

"I don't..."

"...need sleep.  I know.  I oughta come with you..."

"Robert, I promise I won't tell them I'm a demon.  And you're nearly asleep where you stand.  I don't need you attracting the zombie people to us with your wonderful imitation."  The words were teasing, but he spoke gently.  Bobby reached a hand to his face and traced lightly down his beard.

"Come find me when you get back, even if I'm out cold, all right?"

"Of course."  Bobby hugged Crowley, despite the witnesses, and the demon king's arms went around him tightly.  "All right to kiss you, love?"  he whispered.

"Yeah,"  Bobby murmured, shifting back a little so that Crowley could reach his mouth and give him a brief warm kiss.  "Trust you to skip out and leave me to explain to Jody," he murmured after.

"You'll do splendidly.  Toodles."

Then Bobby found himself staring at Jody, since Crowley was no longer standing between them.  She had obviously heard everything, for she gave him a bemused sort of smile.  "And so?"

"He'll do it,"  Bobby assured her awkwardly.  "He's a lot of things, but he keeps his word."  _Eventually,_ he had to admit, but decided not to add that.

"And Sam turned him almost human?"  Jody mused.

"Yeah.  He did."

"I'm gonna let you off the hook for now, Bobby Singer, because we're all exhausted and I've been awake nearly all the time since this thing hit.  Dean and that friend of his have offered to stand watch on the roof and give the others a break, so I'm taking them up on it.  In a few hours time, we'll swap stories, unless there's anything I need to hear right now."

"No,"  Bobby said.  "Crowley's gone after your people and Cas and he can report in seconds if he needs backup or anything, but it's not likely he will.  I'm surprised Dean isn't out looking for Cas."

"He was about to,"  Jody said shortly.  "I've been begging him to stay here but he was on the point of busting out.  He seems to trust your demon too, which is the weirdest thing I've seen since, well, you and him."

Bobby felt himself blushing.  "You said you were gonna give me a break."

"Oh, that's a break.  I'm too tired to say half the things I want to and too worried about my friends.  I'll kill Alex if she makes it back.  She's only seventeen."

"Hunters grow up fast."

"She's not a hunter,"  Jody growled.  "Go get some sleep!"

People were slowly scattering and Bobby saw the blond teenager wave at him.  "Claire, right?"  he asked.  She'd only been introduced a few minutes ago but his brain was rapidly fuzzing with fatigue.

"Yeah,"  she said.  "Jody wants me to show you where you can sleep.  Hey, you know, Sam and Dean talk a lot about you, like you taught them all they know or something."

"Or something,"  Bobby agreed, liking the streak of defiance he sensed in her.  She'd been through a lot already, he thought.  More than a kid should, but then, he'd thought that about Sam and Dean as well.

"There's lots of rooms,"  she said, leading him upstairs.  She opened one door, then backed out again.  "No, that's two singles, you'll need one with a double, won't you?"

 _I have got to stop blushing,_   Bobby told himself, but willpower plainly wasn't enough.  He followed the girl through another doorway to a plain but comfortable looking room done in whites and browns with, yes, a double bed.  "Thank you,"  he said gruffly. "Tell Jody to wake me up if she needs help with anything."

"She'll do that anyway,"  Claire said with the trace of a grin.  Like the others, she seemed to be half in shock at what was going on.  "I'll tell _him_ where you are when he gets back.  You know, like an apology for the balls?"

Bobby carefully didn't grin back and nodded seriously.  "Thanks."

"I hope he can find Alex and the rest,"  Claire said quietly.  "We're really worried.  And Castiel – he should answer, shouldn't he?"

"Yeah,"  Bobby agreed.  "He should."

She nodded and backed out, leaving him alone.  Bobby was too weary even to bother with undressing.  He lay down on the bed and was out, gone, in minutes, without so much as a salt line to block the window.  When he woke, it was with the rested sense of hours having passed, though it was still dark.  A faint scent hung in the air, a blend of sulphur and cologne and as he shifted slightly, a warm body pressed against his and he felt Crowley's cheek against his.  "Hello, love."

Bobby noticed something else.  "I had my clothes on when I went to sleep.  Too tired to take 'em off."

"So now you're more comfortable,"  the demon pointed out.

"And freezing."  Sleepily Bobby shifted to pull the covers back and climb beneath, hugging Crowley close as he joined him.  "Uh, did you find Jody's people?"

"I found the humans, yes, but they hadn't seen Castiel.  So we have to utilise other methods to find where he is."

Bobby wasn't sure he liked the sound of that;  besides, it wasn't unheard of for the angel to be so involved in something he just didn't answer, and he had no time sense whatsoever.  That wasn't a good reason for a bunch of people to go hunting for him in the middle of all this.

"What's going on out there?"

"Chaos,"  Crowley said, sounding distinctly disapproving.  "Human civilisation has been knocked back a few."

"A few what?"

"Centuries or so."

"That can't be...it can't be that big,"  Bobby said weakly.

"I've heard that before."

Bobby tapped his side, just suggesting a poke in the ribs, but he couldn't help a grin.  Some of Crowley's former playfulness was back, he thought; almost as though a few weeks of being appreciated really had perked him up.  The grim King of Hell whom he'd first seen, after Castiel dumped him back on Earth really was becoming...more human.  Probably not a good idea to say so.  "Later, your Majesty,"  he grumbled at him. "You see any – I don't know  - cops, National Guard?"

"I didn't exactly wander the streets any more than I had to,"  Crowley said.  "I saw groups of people.  I saw a Leviathan eating someone and heard plenty of screams.  Power's off, by the way.  When we got here, it was because of not attracting attention, but apparently the entire grid is down."

Bobby sat up, dislodging Crowley.  "We have to talk to Jody.  It's not safe for any of us to stay here."

"I worked that out a while back,"  the demon said, "but while we have a vampire on guard, it's safe enough.  Most things will avoid one of his kind – not as good as one of mine, of course, though good is relative..."

"Has anyone worked _that_ out yet?  About Benny?  Or did Sam or Dean say anything?"

"I haven't been here, remember, love, but it doesn't seem so.  I think he's been outside on the roof the whole time.  He and I deflect the monsters.  But yes – once the food runs out in this city, not even a panic room or extra guns will keep out the survivors, no matter what Jody's hotelier/survivalist/ex-boyfriend thinks."  His flat, matter of fact voice gave Bobby the shivers and not, as Crowley himself might say, the sexy kind.  "Come on, lie down.  Jody's finally asleep, saw for myself when I came in.  We can talk with them in a few hours."

He sounded, Bobby thought, as though he badly wanted some relaxation time himself.  With the only person here, most likely, who cared for him.  So he settled back down, letting Crowley pull the covers over them and cuddle into him.  He stroked Crowley's hair and down his back and felt the King's light kiss against his neck and then his hand drifting lower to Bobby's groin. "Not interested in lettin' me get any more sleep, are you?"

"What gave me away?  Oh, _this_?"

Despite everything, Bobby had to laugh as he hugged the demon to him.  "Just maybe.  C'mon then, you horny bastard."

Some time later, still breathing hard, Bobby leaned his head back on the pillow and said, "Damn."

"Hm?"

"You said the power was out."

"Hm?"

"No hot water for showers."


	12. Chapter 12

Bobby was sure his teeth were still chattering when he went downstairs in the early morning, determinedly clean, wearing clean clothes.  There was a common room full of anxious people there, even Benny Lafitte, who stood as far from the others as he could get.  Bobby looked from face to face; mostly strangers, though he knew the second teenaged girl had to be Jody's Alex, and the too-cheerful blond woman in a sheriff's uniform, with her arm in a sling, would be Donna.  There was Philip the hotelier/survivalist, another early-middle aged man and woman whom he mentally classified as Average White Bread, a woman in evening wear who had to be at least seventy, and two young olive-skinned men both sporting various cuts and abrasions on their faces and arms.  These last two, he thought, would be the other people rescued with Donna and Alex.  None of them, to Bobby's eye, were hunters or knew anything of that world.  Well, they'd learn or die.

His gaze went to Sam and Dean, who leaned against a wall, coincidentally between Benny and anyone else.  Probably Benny had asked for that.  The boys weren't looking too friendly, but then, Crowley next to him probably had something to do with that.  The King's shoulder pressed lightly against Bobby's, but the older hunter didn't say anything to him about PDA.  For Crowley, this was nothing and also, Bobby needed that contact right now.  He had, he knew, walked into the middle of an argument.

"The government will sort things out,"  the silver-haired woman in evening clothes was saying in a dignified manner. "The last news report I saw on television said we should all stay in our homes and wait for the National Guard to direct us."

"There is no National Guard!"  Philip said loudly.  "The government has fallen and nothing has taken its place.  We have to get out of the city and set up our own settlement."

Someone else pitched in and Bobby lost track of individual voices in the verbal mayhem.  He blinked when another voice overrode them, clear and sharp and direct.  "SHUT UP,"  Jody Mills yelled, and there was blissful and shocked silence.  Bobby saw Benny Lafitte grin in appreciation.  "Thank you,"  Jody said with heavy sarcasm.  "People, if you believe rescue is coming, take a look down the street at the looting and the worse stuff that is going on.  Donna got her arm broken by some lowlife inside her own sheriff's office when she and the others went there to collect the weapons.  They had to barricade themselves in the armoury for two days before Crowley here found them."

"Thank you!"  Donna mouthed to the surprised Crowley, giving him a beaming smile.  Some of the others also looked at him in a confused way.  Crowley, if you didn't know him, looked not at all like someone capable of a one-man rescue mission.  He had magicked up one of his top of the line suits, wearing it with a silver-grey shirt and a fine red tie.

"Philip, sorry to take over in your place,"  Jody went on, "but nobody here is a soldier and if you try to walk out of the city, you'll all die.  Everybody and his uncle tried to drive out and the roads are now full of abandoned vehicles and creatures – and people wandering about."  Creatures, Bobby thought; she's trying not to say anythin' about supernatural things and that's not gonna work for long.  He looked to the boys, saw Dean's worried look and Sam's inward thinking.  _Castiel, we really could use you comin' back about now._

"Well, we can't drive out for the same reason,"  Philip answered Jody.  "We talked about that.  If we can't drive and we can't walk, what the hell are we supposed to do?  Tunnel out?"

Jody hesitated and beside Bobby, Crowley took his opportunity.  "If I might, Sheriff?"

"No,"  Dean growled. 

"You don't want me to explain?"  Crowley asked him.  "They really are going to need to know."

"What the hell are you talking about?" Mr White Bread asked, rather belligerently. 

"Is the vampire going?"  asked the dark-haired teenager.  She nodded to Benny, just as Bobby thought _oh shit_.  Benny's blue eyed stare was suddenly very watchful, but he didn't move.

"That's up to Dean and Sam, cher,"  he said quietly.

"He's been out on the roof on guard since he got here, Alex,"  Claire said dismissively.  "He hasn't chomped on anyone here that I know about and he's Dean's friend, so why are you picking on him?"

Jody had to yell again to get everyone to quiet down.  She moved in between the two teenagers, saying something low and fierce to both of them.  They gave identical shrugs, but Alex didn't stop watching Benny.  Everyone else seemed to decide that the vampire reference was only teenage noncomprehensibility.  The sheriff muttered direly as she reached Sam and Dean, beckoning Bobby closer also.  "Sorry,"  she muttered.  "I kind of pre-empted things there.  I know I should've agreed to come to your place before, but I was still hoping the army or whoever would get here.  And then Donna and the others went missing..."

"It's okay.  The bunker is the safest place we know,"  Sam promised her. 

"Hold on a moment, boys.  I've got one or two things to say,"  Bobby said, loudly enough for everyone to look at him.  "This isn't a goddamned debate, it's your lives.  Anybody wants out on their own, you're free to do that. Come with us to the bunker or off into the woods with Phil and all his guns.  Or whatever else.  But stop wasting our time because it isn't limitless."

Jody nodded, her eyes wide.  Crowley chuckled softly beside him.  "I love it when you're bossy, darling," he said.  Bobby noted, at that, the hostile stares they were getting from Mr and Mrs White Bread.

Dean moved closer to them.  "Crowley, can you handle mass transportation?"

The demon's gaze flickered over the people.  "Shouldn't be a problem...bestie."

Dean groaned.  "I'm sorry, okay?  I'm fucking sorry."

Crowley looked at him, an expression of resignation on his face.  Quite plainly, he didn't much care for Dean at the moment. 

Philip came over to them, looking from Jody to Bobby, as though sensing he had better be careful around the older hunter.  "Some of us are gonna head out to my cabin,"  he said.  "If your friends got in, I can sure get out, and get the others out too.  Which way did you come through town?"

Bobby opened his mouth to speak, then turned to Jody.  "I got to tell them,"  he said and she nodded.  "Philip, look, we didn't walk in.  We got, uh, a ride..."

"From what?"  the survivalist asked.  "National Guard helicopter?  And they just dropped you off, no noise, no fuss?"

"Look at me, Dr Phil,"  Crowley said, and when the man did, puzzled, Crowley snapped his fingers and the ball of fire floated in the air above his hand.  Philip stumbled back, eyes wide, fumbling to make the sign of the cross.  Crowley laughed.  "So you have half a clue.  That's interesting."  Gasps and cries indicated he now had the attention of the entire room, but the silver-haired woman stared back at the demon king, eyes narrowed.  "I can disappear from here and appear again wherever I like,"  Crowley said.  "I can take people with me."

"To Hell!"

"No-o, not this time, but I'm sure you're on my list somewhere, darling."  He looked away from Philip, meeting the eyes of person after person, lingering on the elderly woman's still beautiful, elegant features.

"I think my husband met one of your people once,"  she said to Crowley, her voice faint but determined, the tone of one who will not be seen to let the side down.  "He had cancer....and then he was totally cured overnight.  He got drunk, several months afterward, and told me he had made a deal with a demon for a cure, that he would be taken to Hell within ten years.  I didn't believe him, of course, but he fell under the wheels of a car, ten years to the day."

"What's your name, love?"  Crowley asked.

"Margaret.  Margaret Reichart."

"Well, Margaret, you have my word that if you choose to throw in your lot with us, I will not be taking you to Hell.  Rather, I will personally escort you to the establishment known as the bunker, which you will make classier by your mere presence."  He bowed and a sudden smile lit Margaret's face, evoking the beauty she still carried from her younger days.

"We're out of here,"  Mr White Bread announced.

"We'll have no truck with your godless ways,"  Mrs White Bread echoed, though her voice was a little shaky.  "Perverts like you are what brought us to this pass and you won't win us with conjuring tricks!"

The three of them stalked out and Crowley turned to Bobby, mouthing, _"Conjuring tricks?"_ with an expression of stunned outrage.

"Donna!"  Jody said in disappointment as she saw the other sheriff move to follow Philip.  "We just got you out of trouble – Crowley did, rather – and you're just gonna jump back into it?  Philip doesn't have two clues to rub together.  You know me and you remember the Winchesters.  The bunker..."

"Anywhere around them is trouble,"  Donna blurted, looking guilty.  "If we can just get out of the city and away from people till things calm down, I'm sure that's best."

"Where's Alex?"  Jody asked a few minutes later. 

"She's going with Philip's lot too,"  Claire said dully from her seat.  "She said she's not going anywhere a vampire is, not after what she's been through."

"I don't have to go back with you,"  Benny said swiftly.  "Tell the girl..."

Crowley shook his head at that.  "Without you they won't survive,"  he said. 

Benny looked at Jody, seemed about to say something, but a scream from the lobby made everyone start.  Benny blurred into motion while most of the others were still deciding how to react.  Crowley blinked out.  Bobby muttered something dire and headed that way. 

In the lobby stood a creature currently ripping a human being – to wit, Mr White Bread - as though he had been papier mache.  It snarled and swung its head to face its current antagonist, Benny Lafitte, who moved lightly like a great cat.  The thing looked horribly, mundanely human....except that its form blurred and changed from male to female to black to Latino to white, a swift passage of images reshaping the flesh whose hands ripped and whose teeth savaged and bit bloody shreds from the carcass.  Benny snarled in answer and jumped at it, getting a grip of its neck as Crowley appeared behind it, a demon blade in his hand.  The thing was occupied with Benny, giving the demon a chance to get close and stab into its back.

It fell wetly to the ground atop its victim.  Second victim, Bobby saw with saddened horror.  The person sprawled and torn on the carpet was, predictably, Mrs White Bread.  Despite her mindless and homophobic behaviour, she had not deserved this.

Benny's teeth were fully visible, and bloody.  He was trying to calm down, half maddened by the blood smells emanating from the three fresh corpses, two human and one shifter.  Then another scream came from the top of the stairs.  Dean ran up them, followed by Sam.  Bobby grimaced;  getting between a vampire and blood sounded like the deed of the ultimate sucker to him, no pun intended, but his shotgun was with his kit in his room and the trouble upstairs was between him and it.

Then he heard Jody's voice.  "Mr Lafitte!  This way, please.  I need your assistance here – can you get this door open?"

Jody stood by the hotel's barricaded front doors, which had plywood nailed to them and a couple of planks over it, maybe refugees from some do-it-yourself job.  Her voice held that authoritative note common to law enforcement personnel, and army sergeants, and Bobby saw the vampire respond to it like anyone else with a brain;  he did what she said.  Further away from the blood, he was already calming down.  "You sure you want me to open that, cher?"  he asked Jody.  "We don't know if more are out there."

"Look that way, Mr Lafitte,"  Jody said, and pointed along the wall.  Near the corner, the darkest area, they could see a roughly man-sized hole punched in the bricks, which lay scattered nearby.  A chill breeze blasted its way inside.  "We warded the door and windows after nailing that stuff to them, so that shifter just walked through the wall.  But I'm not going to ask people to go out through there on brick shards and glass and whatever else, so if you would?"

Benny bowed his head in an unconsciously gallant gesture.  "Of course."  Then he reached out to the door and pulled the plywood and planks off as though they were pieces of paper pinned to a board.  When he pulled it open, more freezing fresh air rushed in, clearing the blood smell from the interior.  Benny stood there breathing it in for several moments before he turned, and his fangs were retracted, his blue gaze calm.

Crowley walked past the vampire saying, "I'll check outside for more.  You keep an eye on the folks here."  The vampire nodded.  By the time Crowley had dispatched a pack of zombies attracted by the noise – they burned quite nicely – Sam and Dean were back as well, cleaning their blades.  "Ghouls,"  Sam said grimly.  "They just climbed right in that nice window somebody left unlocked for them.  Guess Phil wasn't as security conscious as he might have been, wherever he is."

Benny looked at the morass of body parts and sludge that now covered the lobby.  "Don't think he's in there.  He's gotta be in the basement."

"I will check," said one of the young men and ran off before anyone could suggest he take backup.  Dean muttered something and went after him, but there was no screaming.  They came back with a shamefaced-looking Philip.

"Dude was locked in his panic room,"  Dean said shortly.  "Seems helping out was kinda low on his to do list."

"I want you all out of here,"  Philip retorted.  "You're bringing these hellish creatures down on us!"

Sam looked aside at that and shrugged slightly.  "We could take these folks back to the bunker now,"  he suggested.  "I mean, Crowley could, if he's willing." The demon nodded to Bobby, when the hunter looked at him questioningly. Bobby went on. "Well then, since every thing out of Purgatory seems to know we're here now, anybody willin' to take a ride put your hand up."

Philip glared at them and pulled his arm free of Dean's hold before stalking away with what dignity he could muster. 

"We're not certain of what you mean,"  one of the young men spoke up.  "But we go with you and your friends."

"What's your name, son?"  Bobby asked.

"Ali.  This is my cousin Moh – Mohammed."

"Well, we're gonna get you to somewhere safer than a big city, I promise you that.  Then you can decide what you want to do.  How about you?"  He realised he had forgotten her last name and belatedly tacked on, "Margaret?"

"I think perhaps things are rather more out of control than I thought,"  she conceded.

Crowley smiled at her and offered his arm.  Margaret nodded graciously to him as she accepted it.  The demon king looked around at the assembled people.  "I can transport you all,"  he said.  "But I don't do this sort of thing out of the goodness of my heart, because I don't have any.  Once you're in the Winchester rabbit hole, if you want to leave it, you'll have to do so under your own steam."

"Where are we going, exactly?" Claire Novak asked.

"Lebanon, Kansas,"  Sam told her.

"Huh?"

"Centre of the continent."

"What?"

"Not me,"  Dean said tersely.  "I'm going to find Cas."

"Where do you plan to look?"  Crowley inquired politely. 

"He mightn't be anywhere near Sioux Falls,"  Jody said.  "I'm sorry, but that's the truth."

Dean shrugged.  "The rest of you have got to get out of here,"  he acknowledged.  "Power's gone and so's the heating.  But Cas is in whatever hole he's in because he answered our call and went after Donna and the others."

"I thought he'd been with you the whole time,"  Bobby said. "Didn't he take them to where they were headed?"

"No, they drove, after Cas took off to do angel stuff, but he did come back when I, uh, prayed about our missing people." 

"And he didn't find them,"  Bobby murmured.  "That doesn't sound right.  Dean, Crowley's got ways of searching that you don't have.   You're a good hunter, but you're not up to an army of things out of Purgatory.  If what just happened doesn't convince you all to stick together, I don't know what will.  We'll find out where Cas is, but Jody's right;  he could be anywhere on the damn planet, or off it.

"This bus is leaving,"  Crowley announced, clearly bored with proceedings.  "Hands up who's going with me."

Bobby was the only one who actually held Crowley's hand for the teleport, mostly because Crowley grabbed it, in front of everyone and all.  As Benny had done before, the others linked off Bobby, hands on shoulders for the most part, except for Margaret, with her hand on Crowley's arm as though about to enter an elegant ballroom.

There was no sound, no warning, only an abrupt change in the air from almost-freezing and damaged hotel to the warm blandness of the bunker.  And that was all Bobby knew of it.  He saw the walls of the bunker form around him and then disappear into blackness.

Bobby smelled Hell's iron stink before he saw anything and this time he didn't want to open his eyes.  He pulled his hand away violently and swore softly, like a prayer.  Crowley began to say something, but Bobby staggered and could no longer hear him.  He did open his eyes then but faced only cave darkness.  Cold air blasted him and then just as swift, an assault of heat that drove the hunter to his knees in a shaking fall. 

_Crowley_ _!_

He meant to scream aloud but there was no sound.  Instead of hauling air into his lungs, he felt agony in his chest as though someone had stabbed him to the heart.

_No air...._


	13. Chapter 13

He was lying on hard ground now, gasping raggedly but so relieved to be gasping air that he didn't care at all.  Voices above him; one voice primarily, giving orders.  Hands lifting him carefully, placing him on a softer surface...a bed?  That first voice again, male and gravelly with fury.  He tried to hold on, to extract some sort of meaning from the words, but slipped out of consciousness anyway.

Time....passing.....

Bobby Singer awoke with a gasp, already trying to throw himself into motion.  Bed, draperies, an anxious female voice as hands tried to hold on to his shoulders.  Blearily, Bobby forced his eyes open to behold a stunningly attractive young woman in black...lingerie?... sitting beside him, hands on his arm as she babbled what were probably supposed to be comforting words.  "Sir, you're safe, we're guarding you, everything is completely all right, _ow_!"  Bobby hadn't meant to elbow her as he pulled free and muttered confused apologies as he pushed the dark red and gold draperies of the bed aside and realised exactly where he was.

He was staring at a certain red velvet couch and across the large room, a drinks cabinet carved from golden wood.  To wit, Crowley's personal chambers in Hell.  His stomach seemed to lurch, but he only dry-heaved;  nothing there to retch up.  When he tried to get up, he lost his balance and fell back again.  The young woman – _demon_ , Bobby reminded himself grimly – was on her feet now, smiling encouragingly at him.  She made a motion and he found himself upright, like a puppet whose strings have been tugged.  The door opened and another demon came in, older man, white-bearded and dressed like a butler.  Guthrie, Crowley's majordomo or whatever the hell he was called.

"It's very nice to see you again, sir,"  Guthrie said, with a little bow of the head.  He waved a hand at the girl, who hurried out, her filmy black garments lifting with the speed of her exit.  "The King has been told you're awake and he'll be here as soon as he's done with his present duties.  Meanwhile, is there anything I might get you?"

"Drink,"  Bobby growled.  He didn't bother to specify, but the shot of Glenfiddych which appeared in Guthrie's hand was precisely what he had had in mind.  He put it down swiftly and held out the empty glass for another.  Hell was already acting on his mind, had been since before he was awake, judging by what he'd experienced, and one shot of good Scotch was not going to do the job.  He sank two more before nodding with reluctant satisfaction.

"Your suit is ready, sir,"  Guthrie murmured, with not the hint of an indication that Bobby was anything but well-attired – in faded jeans, t-shirt and beaten-up corduroy jacket – but that he was, of course, now ready to go upmarket.  "If I may..."

"No more demon mojo,"  Bobby growled.  He looked down at himself.  Since he hadn't actually battled the shifter or anything else himself;  the clothes were still reasonably clean and _his_ , damn it.  He'd only put 'em on a couple of hours ago, never mind that he felt as though days had passed.  "And I don't think I need to get dolled up yet.  If Crowley don't like it, he can say, but till then..."  He shot the demon a warning look, but Guthrie was too cluey to give any hint of a reaction and only bowed slightly.

Then the doors opened and Crowley stalked in.

He was different, here.  Bobby had noted it the last time, when he and Crowley had arrived here moments ahead of an unfriendly demon posse.  Crowley here was conscious of being King, of the need to stay ahead of the pack, even among his allies.  By definition, Hell was made up of bastards of many stripes and they were your allies only so long as it suited them.  Crowley moved as though he was willing to attack someone at any moment, though dapper and elegant in the black suit, the neatly trimmed beard, the dark eyes having an almost luminous, catlike quality as his gaze passed briefly over Guthrie and then rested on Bobby.

"Leave us."

As the door closed behind the other demon, Bobby saw another change pass through Crowley.  It wasn't that his guard went down;  the hunter was reasonably sure that never happened, but there was a subtle change in his demeanour and his expression as he watched Bobby.  He seemed to be waiting for Bobby to react, maybe to growl at him, but at the same time he watched the hunter as though he couldn't look away, as though he had not expected to see him again.

"What happened?"  Bobby asked.  He took a step forward, not sure whether to approach or not, but it didn't matter.  Crowley closed the distance and reached towards him, almost hesitant, his hands gripping Bobby's shoulders as the hunter enveloped him in the tightest bear-hug he could manage.  "You dumb idjit,"  Bobby muttered against his neck, "you could've fuckin' _warned_ me!"

"No time, love,"  Crowley answered, his voice sounding a little muffled.  He made no attempt at all to loosen Bobby's hold.  "I said I'd take everyone to the bunker and that I did;  I shook all of them off except you and then we 'ported again.  All within a microsecond, not that I'm boasting."

"Nothing was chasing us this time,"  Bobby said.  "You didn't have to jump into Hell and drag me with you unless somethin' _else_ is going on you didn't tell me about."

"Aside from another apocalypse?  I suppose not, but I prefer not to tell the Winchesters and company _all_ my plans.  I needed to be here and as for dragging you..."  Crowley sighed, a long weary sound against Bobby's chest.  "I didn't want to be without you.  So bite me."

Bobby rubbed his back, almost automatically with one hand, easing his hold on Crowley with the other.  "Nah, you'd like it too much.  But they're okay – the boys and the old lady and the rest?"

"They arrived safely and there were no other monsters in the bunker.  Beyond that, I can't promise anything.  But do remember, time travels more swiftly here.  They've barely had a chance to realise you and I aren't there, though you've been asleep for more than twelve hours."

That reminder did help take the edge off, Bobby thought.

"I've shielded this place so Hell shouldn't affect you as much as it did before.  You'll need to tell me how well it works;  I haven't tried that spell before within the confines of my realm."  He seemed already more confident, more jaunty, and Bobby smiled briefly at him.  Funny how much Crowley liked cuddling, when he couldn't have had much experience of it before.  He responded to petting rather like a cat, with about that much respect for personal space.

"Where did I go, Crowley?  I remember bein' aware of Hell and letting go of you...and then it was like I was on fire and freezing at the same time and trying to breathe in, but there was no air."

"Hell,"  the demon king said softly.  "Hell without structure and form, the basic stuff which demons can turn into any shape they please.  As the King, I hold Hell's forms..."  He shrugged a little in Bobby's grasp.  "There aren't any words in any language humans speak.  But don't do that again, love, please don't."  There was real fear and pleading in his voice.  "I nearly couldn't reach you and if I couldn't, no other demon could."

"Wasn't exactly thinking straight,"  Bobby huffed.  "So what are we goin' to do, without Sam and Dean or anyone else helping?  You were pretty keen on everyone getting together, so now are you just going to dump them and go it alone?"

"No.  We'll need them soon.  But first we have to retrieve Castiel."

"You do know where he is?  Why the fuck didn't you tell Dean?"

"Because I am, oddly enough, not certain.  And I didn't need Squirrel going off, ah, half-cocked."

"Purgatory?"

A slight downwards movement of Crowley's head against his chest.  To be sure Bobby said, "That's _not_ right?  Look, move where I can see your face, all right?"  Crowley moved slightly back.  "Why don't you think he's in Purgatory?  If it's opened up and sure looks like it has, maybe Cas...fell down a hole or something."

"I've got people in there reporting back,"  Crowley said, as though it was obvious.  Bobby gritted his teeth.  _Sometimes_ , a good thumping seemed the only thing to get some sense out of the demon.  Crowley seemed oblivious as he went on cheerfully.  "The rules of Purgatory have altered like you wouldn't believe, over the past 48 hours or so.  Near as I can work out; the creatures in there have been passing freely into the Earth plane, and I suppose some unlucky sods from your side could have wandered the other way.  But my people say there's no report of any angel at all showing up.  Much to their disappointment."

Bobby thought of something else.  "Purgatory monsters could come into Hell then, couldn't they?"

"Only if they're quite mad, which I suppose could be the case, and only because I've set up this portal, not because of the Darkness mess your boys caused.  I've got Hell on lockdown, though, for everyone except myself.  Some demons are trapped topside but they'll not be too worried about that.  Probably having a party and burning my effigy as we speak."

"You don't think Hell could've opened up like Purgatory?"

Crowley's laugh was humourless.  "I would know, love.  We would _all_ know about it if that had happened.  Ever read James Blish's _Black Easter_?"  Bobby shook his head.  "Excellent book;  you should read it.  A wealthy businessman pays a black magician to call up all the demons in Hell whose names he knows, to set them free on Earth for one night, to see what they would do.  They bring down human civilisation and the City of Dis rises in Death Valley.  Trust me, if Hell merged with Earth, you couldn't miss it."

"Well, if he's not topside and not here or Purgatory, there's only one other place, right, and it's not a problem if he's there, apart from the fact he's not fucking well listening to us."  Bobby cast a glance around the room to make sure.

"They don't call, they don't write..."  Crowley leaned back in his arms so that he could meet Bobby's eyes.  "I imagine that Heaven has done the same as Hell re a lockdown....not that they aren't always locked down, the paranoid little parakeets.  Can't be sure whether Cas dropped in home voluntarily for a visit or somebody took him in a sack, but by the process of elimination, which I'm glad I don't have to experience for myself, that's where he is.  Given his fixation on your Winchesters, he's probably not staying there because he wants to.  Heaven knows the Darkness, Robert.  It's the oldest realm, the one that sprouted the others, the one Lucifer fell from, use your noggin!  They're locked down because they _know_ what it is and they're fucking terrified."

"Zombies,"  Bobby said, thinking it over.  "The monsters of Purgatory busting out.  Fricking nightmares.  Monsters stronger'n they should be, like a banshee got me to wander outside on a winter night with no weapons, no nothin'.  They're knocking humanity over, but I'm still not seeing anything that would shake Heaven."

He expected Crowley to say something sarcastic about his lack of perception, but the demon only sighed.  "Without humanity, what is Heaven, Robert?"

"Don't get deep on me now..."

"You're their purpose.  We've seen a tiny bit of the Darkness effect, but imagine it worldwide;  all those humans with their governments and weapons and hatreds, now no longer top of the food chain.  There's no one in charge, only people wandering around like bait, which they are."

"Your purpose too,"  Bobby said, seeing it.

Crowley nodded, and that chilled Bobby to the gut.  As he held Crowley, standing in the heart of Hell itself, he began to put together not only what the demon king had just said, but all that had happened since Castiel had come to him in his heaven, not even two months ago.

"You want me to go back."

"No,"  Crowley said, his voice harsh, as though it hurt him to speak.  "That's the last fucking thing I want."  He pressed close against Bobby again and the hunter's arms tightened around him.  "But if human civilisation is destroyed, it's going to be...absolute crap for business."  Bobby ignored the attempt at levity.  He knew the boys would probably rant at Crowley about the angle he took, lack of empathy, blah, blah, but, as Bobby thought, at least you knew where Crowley stood.  He would never say he enjoyed the human world, even if he did.  "And I'm wondering,"  the King said very softly, "whether Castiel foresaw any of this, when he sent someone to me from Heaven."

"They can't do that, can they?"

"I don't know.  I'm a demon."

Bobby came to a sudden decision.  Maybe it was the hurt in Crowley's voice, maybe he just wanted to, but the difference in speeds of time between Hell and the world came to mind.  If he took a few hours here, those on the earth plane would not notice and as for those in Heaven, who knew?  He sure wasn't in a hurry to break back into that ultimate gilded cage.  He raised a hand to cup Crowley's face and make him look at Bobby.

"I got out of Hell, remember.  You think Heaven's gonna hold me if I don't want to stay there?  _If_ I do this, I'm coming back."  He bent down and kissed Crowley, deep and gentle, felt his surprise in the momentary freeze before the other responded.  "You got any appointments set up for today or tonight, whatever damn time it is here?"

"Nothing I can't cancel,"  the King said huskily, and tugged Bobby along to the bed.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I here announce a short (hopefully) hiatus. I may get some more of this story done in the next week and a bit, I'm not sure, but after that I have a hospital admission - nothing too life-threatening - and won't be up for sustained work after that for awhile.
> 
> This means I am depending on the rest of you to continue posting your fics and keep me entertained!


	14. Chapter 14

 

Bobby Singer stood before the portal of Heaven.

Strictly speaking, it was one of Heaven's back doors.  Crowley had taken him to it, but stayed well back from the clearing in the woods with the air slightly glowing before them.  The one in the playground, he said, was "compromised."  This one was deep in the Maine wilderness area, though Bobby had to take the demon's word for it, as for how Crowley had found it.  "Just happened across it.  There are more holes in the walls than there used to be,"  Crowley had said.

"Look – Cas 'ported me or whatever it is angels do, "  Bobby said nervously. "How do I know..."

"Dean and Sam have been to Heaven as living men,"  Crowley pointed out.  "Are you going to let them show you up?"

Bobby turned and gave him one of his best glares.  "Those boys' idea of a plan is to do it and see what happens.  Last time I went along with one of their genius ideas, I got shot dead." 

"Well, you are loaded for...almost anything, love."

"Demon mojo,"  Bobby muttered.  "What if your magic just blows up when I walk through the portal and takes me with it?"

Despite all his years as a hunter and a researcher into magic; human, demonic and angelic, Bobby had never heard nor read of anyone accepting temporary demonic marks to give them certain abilities.  It was like suddenly becoming a superhero and being shoved into combat without any chance to see how his powers worked.  He had a feeling that this deal would count as another black mark to send him to the other place, next time he died.  Not that that bothered him like it used to, for some reason....

Crowley considered and opened his mouth to say something else.  Suddenly Bobby just didn't want to hear another theory.  He muttered direly and stepped forward.

_*_

_They had made love almost desperately, and then Bobby had slept again, waking more refreshed than he expected to be, in Hell.  At some point, Bobby couldn't even remember what had prompted him, but he had asked Crowley whether he would consider leaving Hell permanently.  The demon had been silent for a long time, looking over Bobby's shoulder rather than at him._

_"I don't think the former is possible, Robert.  We – demons – are part of Hell;  what formed this realm formed us and as you know, we only inhabit bodies, we don't own them.  We obtain our energy from Hell, as you do from food and drink.  No demon has ever tried to go native, as it were, for more than a short time."_

_"Is that because they get hunted down?"_

_"Well, they do, of course.  There's nearly always some sort of civil disagreement going on and any demon out on his or her own is a sitting pile of ash waiting to happen.  And as King, I try to sweep up any renegades before they can get together and make an opposition that would really annoy me."_

_"Such as Abaddon."_

_"As you say."  Crowley was silent for a long time;  he closed his fingers lightly on Bobby's forearm.  "The few little....rebellions you've seen aren't one-offs, Robert.  They don't stop.  It's all demons have to think about, beyond whatever duties they're assigned.  I made my way up from being a punk ass crossroads demon, as you once charmingly put it, to being the King of that division, and then I took the opportunity that presented itself to overcome Lilith.  She had already begun to think that I was growing into a threat and would have destroyed me, had I not made my move and succeeded.  I managed that on odds no longer than some of my opponents have now.  They just haven't been lucky.  If I was to simply abdicate, no one would believe it was for real and they would join together to come after me.  As they did when Abaddon ruled, because I was Lilith's right hand man, you might say.  I would love to be with you all the time, even if it was only a human lifetime, but demons don't get breaks like that.  Not even when you're the King.  And now, we have to sort out just how you're going to get Castiel out."_

*

Pillow talk in Hell, Bobby thought grimly, and now jailbreaking an angel.  Or whatever.  The slightly glowing air, like a sci-fi forcefield, abruptly flared up in his eyes and he could see nothing, but he completed his stride and felt harder ground beneath his boots.  The flare faded slowly and a white corridor formed around him, utterly pristine, as though someone mopped it three times a day.  The clean lines had their own beauty, but it was stark and cheerless.  Even the air was neutral, like the system within an aircraft.

The doors extended all the way down the corridor, and the other way also, when he turned to find himself apparently in the centre.  Like a fancy hotel...or hospital.  They were the physical icons indicating private "heavens" where individuals or maybe groups enjoyed whatever bliss they wished.  Bobby had to fight back insidious memories of how comfortable his own Heaven had been, how content he had been within it, until Castiel had effectively broken a hole in the wall and let in the fresh winds.

Heaven was so many things to so many souls, but he doubted anyone had seen it as a prison until now.

He and Crowley had discussed ways to achieve his goal.  Bobby closed his eyes and brought all his will to bear upon the thought, the goal:  _Castiel.  I want to be where Castiel is._

He didn't have very long, after all, until Heaven registered an intruder and the Heavenly Host descended to smite his ungrateful ass.

_Damn it, you idjit, where are ya?_

Snap.  He was standing in a garden; plants chest-high around him, blasting him with fragrance.  Bright, delicate flowers bloomed in all the colours he could think of, though of course he had no idea what they were.  He sneezed, violently and with feeling, and it was several moments before he could wipe his eyes dry enough to see.

He was surrounded by angels, at least a dozen of them, standing like figures on a chessboard, with the tall flowering plants about them.  Bobby blinked at the perfect, anonymous faces and gawked at the incongruity of twenty-first century clothing.  This was only so because of his filtering, someone had told him once, perhaps in Heaven itself.  His mind was most comfortable with folk in such clothing;  thus, the angels appeared so to him.  He looked from face to face and finally thought to turn right around and find, of course, the person he sought looking at him blankly.

"What are you doing here, Bobby Singer?"

Castiel didn't look guilty or concerned as he stared at Bobby, but then he never did, Bobby thought grumpily to himself.  Permanent poster boy for the Society for the Terminally Bewildered, maybe.

Around Castiel, the other angels seemed to ease a little, to go off high alert, as it were.  Bobby noted, as an idle curiosity, that he couldn't see any walls to the garden, but nor was there any distance.  After twenty yards or so, everything blurred into vague shapes of greenery.

Then one of the angels stiffened like a hunting dog on the scent.

"Castiel,"  she said, "he has demon taint.  He is human but he has been lent demon powers."

"I can explain that,"  Bobby said hastily, wondering how many folk said that as their last words.  Not too many fronting a pack of pissed off angels, he was sure.  "You remember who you sent me down to help?  Well, he's the one helped me get back here, to damn well rescue you!"

There was a long, considering silence, during which Bobby suffered the stony regard of the angelic company.  Then Castiel glanced to either side.  "I would like to speak with Bobby Singer alone,"  he said, his expression changing not a jot. 

"You need to assist with the preparations,"  said an anonymous angel.  Gorgeous, of course, but Castiel didn't appear to be paying attention and only nodded.

"I will.  This will only take a moment."

"Make sure he's put back in his heaven,"  said someone else and then without so much as a flutter of wings, Bobby and Cas were on their own.  Or at least, Bobby couldn't see them amid the bright flowers.  _Feather dusters,_   he thought, hearing Crowley's drawling Cockney voice saying it and wanting, suddenly, to laugh.

"I bust in on some directors meeting?"  Bobby demanded.  "Are you guys actually planning how to deal with what's going on?"  He didn't really expect an answer;  not one that made sense, anyway, but Castiel's blue gaze was suddenly fixed on him in a most unnerving manner.

"The preparations to scour Earth clean of Darkness and all other creations in preparation to begin again,"  he said calmly.  "My brothers and sisters have decided this is the only way to re-establish the rules laid down at the beginning of my Father's creation plan."

Bobby's mind at first refused to accept what he was hearing.  He experienced a moment of peaceful blankness, followed by gut-clenching fear.  Cas watched him.  "You were supposed to help us,"  the hunter whispered at last.

"It has been decided that humanity is beyond the point of help, even by us."

"And you _agree_ with this?  What about Dean and Sam?  Why did you ever send me back...?"

"This plan was not then formulated."

"Fine,"  Bobby snapped, sensing he wasn't going to get any more.  Maybe Cas was hinting at God's involvement, maybe he meant simply what he said.  "Are you going to help us?  You, not the rest of this pack of...."  He broke off, remembering that the angels could almost certainly still hear him. 

"I cannot,"  Cas said, but he looked at Bobby and nodded once, definitely.  "I am told to put you back in your Heaven."

Bobby closed his eyes.  Pictured gripping Castiel's shoulder, linking him, _lifting._

*

This was too many times waking up face-planted on the ground with people – or demons – trampling around, yelling.  Bobby decided it was time he took a hand in his own destiny.  "Nobody pick me up,"  he growled. "No damn demon mojo.  I'll get up in my own damned good time."

The feet and the voices receded and Bobby noted that the ground under his face was black rock and felt uncomfortably warm.   Around him was red, glowing firelight and a hot breeze which stank of sulphur.  Slowly, feeling aches in every inch of him, he managed to get to a sitting position and see the hand held out to him.  He blinked confusedly at Crowley, who knelt with disregard for his fine suit, and took the demon king's hand.  "We're not in your palace."

"We're next to the lake of fire,"  Crowley said, matter-of-factly.  "You're about one pace from taking a nice refreshing dip, love."

"Is Cas here?"  His memories of Heaven were already receding and jumbling into a mess of white corridors, flowers and Cas' intense blue eyes staring back at him, hiding everything. 

"Yes.  He made them call me."

"So why'm I still lying on a volcano?"

"You said no demon mojo, darling.  My demons know what you are to me and they've taken your word as my own – unusually wise of them.  I take it I have your permission to move you somewhere more comfortable?"

"Yes, damn you..."

"Much too late, Robert."

He bounced slightly on a much more giving surface; the bed in Crowley's chambers, black sheets and red and gold draperies around it.  His head throbbed with a sudden agonising headache and he gritted his teeth, until the demon's hand touched his forehead and he felt the pain recede.  "Thanks.  I don't think....travelling between realms....whatever they are...is real good for the constitution."

"It seems not,"  Crowley said.  He handed a steaming mug to Bobby, who sat up carefully before accepting it and finding that it contained black coffee.

"Thanks,"  he muttered.  Really good black coffee.

He wasn't wearing his own clothes any longer.  Instead, he was clad in bright red pyjamas with small black locomotives dotted all over them.  Damn the King of Hell and his sense of humour, never mind how superfluous that curse was!  Crowley hitched himself up to the head of the bed, next to him, still in his suit but seeming perfectly happy in it.  Bobby shook his head with a faint grin.  Only Crowley.

"What'd you put Cas in?"  he muttered.

"He's an Angel of the Lord,"  Crowley said with fake indignation.  "Would I prank such a being?"

"Without hesitation,"  Bobby said.

"Well, his pyjamas may have a dozen or so pictures of kittens scattered over them,"  the King of Hell conceded.  "He'll probably fix that the moment he realises what he's wearing, which means we'll get several chances to laugh.  In fact, I should go see how he's doing.  See you in a mo, darling."  He leaned across and kissed Bobby's cheek quickly, then vanished.


	15. Chapter 15

"You kidnapped me."

"I rescued you.  Heaven kidnapped you."

"They had my best interests at heart."

"Which I don't, I presume?"  The King of Hell glanced back at Castiel with seeming disinterest, his gaze dwelling on the red pyjama jacket scattered with black and white kittens. "I heard they're considering a clean slate.  Wipe out all higher lifeforms and start again.  What would your daddy say about that, if he was around?"

"You read my thoughts..."

"No.  I read Bobby's thoughts.  Much easier and no headache, at least while he's in my realm.  Am I to believe you'd rather go back upstairs and help your sibs destroy the world  -what the Darkness leaves, I mean?"

Castiel glared.  "No."  A moment later he added grudgingly, "Thank you."

"Thank Bobby."

"I will,"  the angel said with as much dignity as was possible for somebody in kitten pyjamas.

Crowley turned about and paced the length of the room's gray stone floor, which was easy since it contained no furniture.  Hardly any point, with an angel who was only going to stand around and bitch.  "Purgatory is leaking into the Earth plane and Earth is returning the favour,"  he said thoughtfully.  "While your sibs bicker, the creatures of Purgatory are doing quite a number on the human race and everyone else.  If they take much longer, they might not even have to do anything.  Won't that be nice?  Of course, if you were to reinstate the First Curse, plug the leaks, as it were, there wouldn't be anything more to fix.  Once the zombies fall apart,"  he added.

"That's not possible,"  Castiel said.  He looked at his jacket and made an irritated gesture.  The pyjamas disappeared and he was once more clad in his blue shirt, beige pants and trenchcoat.  "Now the First Curse has been cancelled out, you can't just create another First Curse..."

"The point is that Dean Winchester took out Death,"  the King of Hell said with exaggerated patience.  "People haven't stopped dying, have they?  I've had quite a few chances to see that for myself and I'm sure you know it.  So he "killed" Death, did he?"

"If he didn't, what happened?"

"Finally a sensible question, though a sensible answer would be more useful.  The First Curse has been laid, _it cannot be unlaid_ by whatever cause.  It isn't magic – or power – because those came along later.  So what did happen?"

"Are you saying Dean still bears the curse?"

Crowley sighed.  "Did he kill his brother?  No, despite much provocation, he didn't.  What Cain passed to him, after millenia, was now a demon artifact, designed to make the demon better, stronger, faster....did you never watch old television shows, Cas?  No.  Why am I not surprised.  Given to a human, it went awry, like so many gifts given to the wrong person."

"I don't think Cain ever saw the Mark as a gift,"  Castiel said softly.  "Nor did he ever think to be the first of the demons."

"But he was one, from the moment that Mark appeared on his skin,"  Crowley capped triumphantly. "All part of your dear daddy's plan, I'm guessing, to set up the institutions which run so well today."

"I think you're being sarcastic.  Why are you wasting so much time?"

"Excuse me?"  Crowley turned to him again with a sudden frown.  "I was going to give you a gold star.  Exactly how am I wasting time?  You were 'ported from Heaven to Hell..."

"But time is equal now," Castiel protested.  "It could not be otherwise, with leaks in the boundaries between Purgatory and the other realms.  Hell is no longer running on separate time and Heaven can no longer control the time flows within its power.  I thought you knew that."

Crowley stared at him, all signs of amusement gone from his face.  "Bobby,"  he said softly and the hunter was there, disoriented and confused, steadying himself with a hand on the King's shoulder as he took in the gray cell of a room and Castiel's presence.  "Cas has just told me something I should have worked out for myself, but there's no time to let him gloat.  Time in Hell has not been swifter than the Earth plane; it has been running at the same rate."

Bobby frowned as he tried to calculate it.  "You said I slept for more than twelve hours...and then we - it's been more than that now, even if Heaven's time is screwed up too.  Fifteen, sixteen hours with who knows what going on with the boys and everyone else.  And do we even have a fucking clue about how to fix it?  Castiel?  Something that doesn't involve angelic pest control?"

"I'm sorry,"  the angel said gravely.

"Christ,"  Bobby said in anguish and saw Crowley wince.  "Sorry.  I have to get back there.  Even if neither of you two do – please, just get me back to my friends."

Crowley's face was expressionless, but he covered Bobby's hand on his shoulder with his own.  "Coming, Kitten?"  he asked.

*

The first sound Bobby heard was that of a shotgun being racked.  He stood absolutely still.  Crowley had dropped them right into the War Room, of course, and while he and Cas might be okay if shot at, one Robert Singer was not quite so confident.  He had materialised facing a wall of 1950s computer equipment and the gun noise had come from behind.  Of course.

"Is that my shotgun?"  he asked.

"Bobby, you...."   Somebody rushed at him and he was combat-hugged from behind by somebody quite a bit taller.  And bigger. 

"Sam?"

Bobby turned in the young hunter's embrace, somewhat uncomfortably.  "Can you let me go while I still have ribs?"

"Yes, before his boyfriend gets jealous,"  Crowley said.

"Shut up, Crowley.  Where'd Cas go?"

"To find Dean.  What else did you expect?"

"Nothing!  Sam, where's everyone?  What's going on?  Look, I'm sorry, we didn't know about the time..."

"It's three in the morning, Bobby,"  Sam said, dropping his voice as though that would wipe out the effects of their previous loud tones.  "I'm on watch.  Most everyone else is asleep, or trying to be, I guess."   The Sasquatch was fully dressed for the outdoors;  in case he had to go out, Bobby guessed.  "Where the hell were you?  We got our bearings and realised you and Crowley weren't there..."

"Hell,"  Bobby said drily.  "And other places.  We, ah, bailed Cas out of Heaven."

"Do you know what's going on?"

"Kind of but it doesn't help.  Look, how about some coffee and then you go wake up Dean and Jody and whoever else needs to be told."

"No need,"  came Dean's voice and Bobby looked to the doorway to see him there, Castiel just behind him.  A literal wingman, Bobby thought.  "Jody's up and Benny's around someplace.  I told the others to stay put, even though Margaret wants to come and make you coffee and sandwiches."

"Sounds good,"  Bobby said hopefully.

"I'll microwave some pies,"  Sam offered and Bobby sighed.  Crowley chuckled softly beside him and Bobby aimed an elbow at his ribs.  Dean came to hug him and demand where he'd been in almost the same words as his brother.

"Wait till everyone's here so I don't have to keep repeating myself,"  Bobby sighed.  While in the other realms, he had not been hungry at all, as though he was again a spirit, but now his stomach was rumbling and he sought a chair at the table so he wouldn't risk falling over and embarrassing himself again.  Sam slid a plate with a piece of pecan pie on it in front of him with creditable speed, murmuring that he was putting some sandwiches together as well.  Jody Mills hurried in, leaning down to hug him and mutter dire threats in his ear.  On her heels, the vampire who looked like a sea captain;  Benny Lafitte.  Those, Bobby thought, constituted the war council.  The others; young Claire and the two young men who had thrown in their lot with his friends, could properly be considered civilians, although in the world that was becoming, perhaps no one was.

Bobby turned a little to find Crowley and saw the demon king isolated.  Several people had looked at him but no one had greeted him.  Even Cas was being greeted, though the angel's general awkwardness tended to elicit the same in return.  Crowley stood with his hands in his overcoat pockets, appearing indifferent.

Then Benny went up to him, holding out his hand. Startled, Crowley withdrew his own hand from his pocket to clasp it in return.  "We were worried about you,"  the vampire said, in his deep Southern accent. "Glad to see you're all well."  It was almost "you all well."

"We had a few detours to get through to find Castiel,"  Crowley acknowledged.  "Also, we've belatedly discovered that Hell time is no longer running faster.  I thought we had taken 16 minutes, not the same number of hours."

"You want to tell them the rest?"  Bobby asked him softly.

"It'll be better coming from you,"  Crowley said, not adding his usual endearments.  Bobby had thought it was embarrassing, being publicly called "darling" and "love" by a grown man – well, demon - but now he missed it.  He waited while Crowley took the chair next to him and then cleared his throat awkwardly.

"I wish I had good news . . . "

When Bobby finished his account, spiced with comments from both the angelic and demonic peanut gallery, everyone was silent, which made him more nervous than Hell had.  "Well, come on,"  he growled, "somebody's got to have an idea even if it's stupid."

"Why don't they apologise?"

The voice wasn't from any of the people or beings at the table.  It came from the doorway to the corridor where most of the bedrooms were situated.  As one, everybody turned to look in that direction and saw Claire Novak, sleepily clutching a pillow, wearing sweats that were much too big for her.  She focused on the face of the man who had been her father once. 

"Who should apologise?"  Cas asked, clearly thinking she meant him.

"Well, Sam and Dean made this happen, especially Dean because he sliced Death with his own scythe,"  Claire explained in a teenager specialty "It's obvious" voice.  "You seem to think Death can't really be dead, that Dean only sliced his, um, vessel.  So Death probably wants them to apologise."

"Death wants us _dead_ ,"  Dean muttered.

Claire sighed heavily.  "So?  Mr Crowley, you're in charge of Hell, right?"

"I am,"  Crowley said, clearly fascinated.

"And you already took Mr Singer there and he's not dead, so that means you could take other people there.  Why don't you set something up so Death believes he's got what he wants?"  She looked around at the assembled adults.  "It always works for me."

*

"This has to be a first,"  Bobby said, looking around the industrial kitchen with its clutter of utensils and ingredients and its particular, distinctive odour.  "Burger King out to save the world."

Sam put down his load of meat patties on the counter near Dean.  "Works for me.  Anything else you need, Ali?"

From civilians on the sideline, Ali and his cousin Mohammed had suddenly become crucial to the plan.  Alone of all of them, the boys had each spent several years working for the fast food giant, and Ali still did.  This branch restaurant was the one where Ali was employed.

"I think we are ready to fire up,"  Ali answered.  "You won't need us while the _afrit_ is actually here, will you?"

"No,"  Dean sighed.  "So long as you can give me a crash course in the perfect burger just to make sure the bastard stays happy.  Bobby – you reckon Crowley will let us back out, once he gets us into Hell?"

"I guarantee it,"  Bobby assured him.  "He says the last thing he wants is you two back there, causing unrest."

"Right.  Okay, let's rock."

*

Sam watched, silent, as Dean went through the ritual of summoning Death himself.  It was especially tense when they could not even be sure there was anything at the other end.  The aroma of the burgers was intense and while Dean might enjoy that, Sam thought he might throw up if he had to stand here in the kitchen too long.

They were alone.  Bobby thought Death would know if anyone spied on them and so he was protecting their "civilians" back at the bunker.  Jody, Benny, Castiel and Crowley were in their spots, at what Bobby had called a "minimum safe distance, I think."  Safe also included shambling undead, a pack of werewolves spotted and seen off by Benny, and a number of other things that might or might not respect the sanctity of a salt circle.

Dean finished the ritual, glanced at Sam and reached for the nearest temptingly-unwrapped Whopper, made in the classic style, which he held aloft.  "God, I want to eat this,"  he murmured.  "Sam, do you think...."

"That would be for me, I think," said a voice dry as dead leaves, and a cadaverous hand seized the burger from Dean's grasp.  Munching sounds followed and a hum of appreciation, while the brothers stared at the black-suited creature they'd last watched crumble into pieces on the floor of a defunct Mexican restaurant.  "Very nice.  A true master made this one.  Are there fries?"

Silently, Dean passed a bag full of Burger King's finest over into the hand of Death.  He and Sam waited tensely for Death, who looked exactly as he had _before_ crumbling into dust, to finish the burger and several of the fries.  Finally Death said, "Well?"

"Uh, we're sorry,"  Dean managed.

"You're sorry, you mean?  For using my own scythe to cut through me and unleashing havoc upon the world?  That _is_ what you mean?"

"Yes,"  Dean said, desperately.  Sam rolled his eyes.

"And sorry for not killing your brother?"

"No – I mean yes  - well...."

"And exiling yourself to wherever I choose?"

"That's about it,"  Dean agreed.

Death picked up another burger, slowly unrapped it, savoured its scent and bit neatly into it.  "Pick up your game,"  Sam mouthed to his brother. "The script."  Not that there was a script, as such, but if Dean didn't at least say some of the agreed words, the other player in their little drama wouldn't know when to make his move.  Or would alter things.  Dean glared back, waiting with agonised patience for Death to finish the burger.

"Try the grilled chicken,"  Sam suggested, raising his voice just a little as he selected that burger and passed it.  Death accepted it graciously.

"Things look a little rough out there,"  he commented when he was finally done.

"I didn't know it would be like this.  You've seen what's happened – what's still happening,"  Dean pleaded.  He didn't have to fake the break in his voice.  "I wanted to lose the Mark but not at this price."

"You tricked me once,"  Death said, chiding.  "You truly made me believe you would kill your brother in return for me putting you where you couldn't harm anyone."

"I half believed me too,"  Dean admitted.  "It was the scythe, when you passed it to me, I couldn't....it was an impulse move."

"Like so many of your moves,"  Death said, pausing in his burger-munching.  His black eyes regarded Sam for a moment, then back to Dean.

"I can't pay this price,"  Dean persisted.  "You can kill me now that I'm not wearing the Mark, can't you?   You can kill both of us, if that's what you need to put things back how they were?"

"There must be the Mark,"  Death said.

"So where is it?  You hold it, don't you?"

"The Mark is two things,"  Death said, deliberately making them wait.  "It is the physical mark on the holder's skin – Cain's - and yours.  This mark was imbued with the power of the curse, to make Cain wander all his days, which would be endless, and to shield Cain from harm.  It did this by barring the Darkness from the plane of Earth.  Yet consider that even God had never done this before.  At this time, Hell itself was only an idea, a seed dimension.  When Lucifer fell, he expanded that realm with the power and the agony of his own thoughts.  Hell, of necessity, acts upon the world, drawing to it the passed spirits who have done evil. "

Sam wondered whether Death would notice another eye-roll.  The bony face turned towards him and the black eyes fixed him.  Yeah.  Right. 

"Consider that even God had never done this before.  Consider that when the expanding Hell-realm touched against the power of the Mark, it reacted to protect the bearer."

"By making him a demon!"  Sam burst out.

Death seemed pleased, as by a C student making an unusually good grade.  "Even so.  Cain became the first of the demons."

Dean tried to track through Death's torturous logic.  "But Cain passed the Mark to me..."

"The curse.  Not the sign itself.  Cain remained protected, in the sense that he would not die of natural causes.  You were given that power and then you sundered the link between the Mark and its maker when you, ah, attempted to smite Death."  Death indicated his lapel with a courtly gesture.  "The power that was the curse rebounded to the original bearer, now in Purgatory, because he had died as a demon."

"Cain,"  Dean said quietly.  "If Purgatory is open, which it is, then he could be back."

"With the full power of the Mark,"  Sam agreed.  "Boy, he will not be happy with us."

Death shrugged.  "Someone must bear it,"  he said,  "and he is the First Murderer."

"So what the hell is the Darkness then?"

Instead of answering, Death moved closer to the burgers and began investigating their wrappings.  "Not the right question,"  he murmured.  "You know, Dean, you have a future as a short order cook if you wanted it.  These are quite superior burgers."

"Did the Darkness appear?"  Sam asked.  "It did, didn't it, that huge cloud of black smoke or whatever it was..."

"For a split second,"  Death said.  "In the moment you smote me.  That strike broke the lock on Purgatory and that's been your problem, that's what has done such a job on your civilisation."  He smiled, a ghastly expression on the hollowed face.  "If they think to do it, the angels are able to reform the lock."

"So....so you don't have to kill us?"  Sam said hopefully.

Death chuckled softly, like a rattle of bones.

"You forget the need for an apology."

Then he and the Winchesters both startled as there was abruptly a fourth being in the kitchen, standing between Death and the others, in a fine Armani black suit, with red tie.  "I do beg your pardon," said the king of the demons to Death, "but I believe this matter concerns me."

"There is no demonic deal,"  Death said, sounding bored.  "And annoying though they are, the Winchesters are hardly of a stature to concern Hades any more than the usual.  You can wait until they're ready for the racks...or is it the endless queue again?"

"And you forget that I owe them....for a great deal,"  Crowley snarled.  "They will end up with me soon enough, that's true, but the suffering will be even sweeter if they're in their bodies while I drag them to Hell personally."

"That's a movie, isn't it?"  Death asked, unmoved. 

"Call it a personal favour,"  Crowley suggested.  "Owed by me to you, unlimited time to claim, anything I'm reasonably able to grant."

"So I should make a deal with you, Crossroads King that was?"  Death was enjoying this way too much, Sam thought, trying to keep an eye on Dean, Crowley _and_ Death.  Crowley was already off the script and into a chapter all his own, with this favour business.

"Why not?  You want them off the board.  Why should you care how, or how much it hurts?"

Death thought about that, then waved a hand negligently.  With that, Crowley gestured and the brothers felt an iron grip on their collars, like a disembodied, powerful hand lifting them up so that their feet dangled above the ground.  Sam coughed, gagging for breath, saw Dean doing the same, as his vision darkened.  The last thing he saw was the bony, indifferent face of Death's avatar as he reached for yet another burger.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I hope my Darkness AU has made sense. I probably wasted too much of my life thinking about Cain and his Mark :-) This story is moving towards endgame now. I'm editing the final chapter.


	16. Chapter 16

"Sammy?  Wake up, Sam!"  A hand patting his cheek, none too gently.  He coughed and woke, feeling his throat sore, as though that unseen hand had gripped right around his throat.  Dean crouched nearby, watching.  Sam felt a hard smooth surface under him and brushed a hand over it;  marble, cold as a glacier.

"You've been lying there for nearly ten minutes,"  Dean muttered.  "Thought you weren't gonna wake up."

"We're in Hell, aren't we?  Tell me why I should want to."

"You're on the floor of Crowley's penthouse, dude."

With that, Sam sat up, grimacing.  He felt as though Crowley really had dragged them to Hell like one of his freaking hellhounds.  Now he could see the dapper King of Hell himself, smirking down at him, with Bobby Singer standing nearby.  It took Sam a few more moments to remember why that shouldn't be the case.  "Why are you here, Bobby?"

The older hunter shrugged.  "Crowley's gettin' some practice in multi-tasking.  He swept up Jody and the others and dumped 'em back in the bunker.  I can't say I was that keen on another 'porting trip, with the dry heaves and all, but I thought you boys would like the support."

"Yeah, yeah, we do, I just..."  Sam gave it up and got to his feet, if only to be looking down at Crowley again.  _I'm not forgetting,_ he thought, as he watched the demon.  _Doesn't matter if Bobby's here or not, I'm not gonna forget what you are._

Sam sometimes thought he could never forget.  Memories of his attempt to "cure" Crowley kept going through his mind and before that, memories of Crowley's rampage;  how he had threatened to kill everyone Sam and his brother had saved.  The cold viciousness of it.  _Sarah._   And now, at his mercy.

But there had been that almost-cure.  Shreds of humanity, like candlelight in a dark forest.  More, there was Bobby.  _He's different in Hell,_   Bobby had said at one point, not having the words to explain it, but now Sam could see it, as though the power Crowley had was now external; a regality and certainty in him, which might be all a scam.  They were in his private chambers, of a six-star luxury and expensive furnishings favouring red and gold shades, like some fancy bordello with more money than class.

"Don't wander,"  Crowley said meaningfully to Sam and Dean.  "This area of Hell is not kind to wandering spirits, embodied or not, and if you're away from my presence, the laws of physics don't have to be obeyed here.  I have things to take care of, but you'll be observed.  If you need anything that's not here, Bobby can call Guthrie.  Just sit tight and let other people take care of things for the moment."

He paused and looked straight at Sam.  "I'd say I was sorry, but you would have no cause to believe me and even if you did, you would say it isn't enough.  I did what demons do...but I did know better.  I call them fools but I was worse, Sam Winchester.  For what it's worth, though, she's not here."  Sam hesitated, almost asked, but Crowley added hollowly.  "Your Sarah.  She isn't here."

Sam couldn't answer that, there were no words, but he nodded.  Bobby went to the doors with Crowley, speaking to him softly.  Crowley's face was calm, his eyes focused on Bobby's face.  He raised a hand to the hunter's cheek, seemed about to kiss him, then only smiled briefly and went out, opening and closing the door himself just as though he was mortal.

"Before you ask, Guthrie's a sort of demon butler,"  Bobby said.  "And also before you ask, I don't know what Crowley''s doin'.  But take what he said seriously, boys, he ain't bluffing."  He strode towards the drinks cabinet.  "I suggest we have a drink and chill out."

"While the zombie apocalypse goes on above?"  Sam asked.

"That's bein' seen to."

"By the Angel of Thursday and the King of Hell?"

"And a few of their buddies,"  Bobby agreed. "What'll you have?"

They played cards, sitting on the red velvet couch and ornate chairs, using a deck where Dean swore the eyes of the images looked at him and glowed black.  What do you expect?  Sam asked him, and dealt.  Bobby handed out the beers; ice cold and excellent, of no brand that any of them could recognise.  The pressure of Hell was making itself felt, in a tension around them, a nervy watchfulness.  None of the Winchesters' weapons had come along with them and Bobby only shook his head when Dean asked if he was armed.

They had no idea of the time and no way of checking.  All their watches had stopped.  "Wouldn't mean anything even if somebody told us the truth,"  Dean muttered, glancing behind himself for the tenth time.  "God, when are we getting _out_ of here?"

"Could be a while,"  Bobby said.

The brothers stared at him. "Yeah, because that wasn't at all creepy,"  Sam complained.

"I'm guessin' Crowley and Cas are trying to close off Purgatory,"  Bobby explained. 

"Didn't Death do that?"

"I dunno.  Lot of creatures still wanderin' around topside."

It sat well with none of them to be sidelined, held helpless in Crowley's realm.  In the end the game petered out, no one sure who had won.  Sam stretched out on the couch and tried to sleep.  Dean wandered over to the four postered bed with its elaborate tapestries, muttered something incomprehensible and paced away again.  Bobby Singer shuffled the deck of cards and waited for Crowley to come back.  In the end he yawned and went over to the bed, where he lay down on top of the covers and looked up at the canopy.

A long while later, the bed creaked slightly and Bobby opened his eyes, realising he actually had dozed off.  The main lights were down, but there were actual flaming torches in wall brackets, off in the corners, whose glow easily showed him the face inches from his own.  He had to pull his sudden swipe, muttering direly.

"Easy, love,"  the King of Hell murmured, patting him soothingly. 

"Right,"  Bobby whispered back.  "Remember the boys are just over there."

"It's all right, darling, nothing risque in front of the children."   The bed's draperies slid closed with no one touching them and Crowley lay down with a weary sigh.  Bobby was, he noted, still fully dressed as he had lain down, but Crowley was wearing only black boxers and his elaborate dragon tattoos, which he could still see in the dimmed light.

"Boys are startin' to think you might be planning on keeping them here."

"How untrustful.  It's a bit early to think Death has gone happily back to wherever, happy that the evil Winchesters are no more."

"Huh,"  Bobby said.  He could feel himself waking up and wondered whether he had had a night's sleep or not.  "Am I the only one thinks that was pretty easy, fooling Death?  Who's got no reason to trust a Winchester and probably less to trust you."

"No, you're not,"  Crowley admitted.  "Death has his own agenda.  Always."

"Do you know how the others are doing  - Jody and Benny and them?"

"Haven't looked, love."

"And Castiel?"

"Angel business, so I was told."  Crowley sighed deeply.  "It's done, Robert.  Purgatory's borders are up, but there'll be more work for hunters than usual, since we couldn't exactly do a roundup of all the creatures on the face of the planet and herd them back in.  Too much for the hellhounds, poor loves."  Bobby stayed quiet.  After a moment he felt Crowley's hand stroke along his shoulder to his neck, begin to go under his collar.

"No, Crowley..."

"I could block out sound,"  the demon murmured hopefully, "The boys wouldn't hear a thing."

"Don't think so,"  Bobby said slowly.  "Doesn't feel right, not now and not here.  I still feel like something's gonna happen, something I have to be ready for."

Crowley sighed deeply.  "We already _did_ the deed in Hell, if that's what's got your panties in a twist."

"I know."

"And the time difference matter is sorted out."

"I'm gettin' up.  We need to be doing."

"That's rather what I had planned,"  came the soft, irritated murmur from the other side of the bed.  Despite everything, Bobby Singer couldn't help a secret grin.

*

"So you want Sam and me to sit here in Hell while you guys go check out our bunker?"  Dean liked to have things clearly set out.  "Not happening, Crowley."

"Death is just waitin' to see if we were playing him,"  Bobby shot back before Crowley could.  "He is not some dumb fuck who will believe a fake ID with Bikini Inspector on it!  If you wait, Crowley and I can at least set up some barriers at the bunker so you can do your house arrest at home.  Death can't keep eyes on you forever – no, Crowley, let me -  he can't, he's got to go back into the system, not leave the Reapers managin' without him.  The system you and Cas put back into play when you shoved Purgatory back into its drawer?"  He turned to Crowley at that point and the King nodded, clearly fighting amusement.  "And when Death eventually finds out you're back, as he's gonna, well, it isn't the first time you two came back.  Crowley can spin some story and so long as you amuse the bony fucker and _don't_ do anything like you did, Dean, ever again, it'll probably be all right.  Death ain't a demon or some other thing that'll hunt you forever."

Crowley made a brief, annoyed murmur, sitting next to Bobby on the horrific velvet couch.  Bobby forgot his audience enough to pat Crowley's arm.  Dean let out a 'get a room' sort of groan, and Crowley looked up, eyes flashing red.  Before he could speak, however, Bobby said to him, "You mind?"

Crowley nodded tightly.  "All yours, love."

This time there wasn't any derogatory sound.  Dean started to say something, but Bobby's growl overrode him.  "Shut up, Dean.  You too, Sam, if you were thinkin' of a smart comment.  Do you two have any idea how much Crowley has helped you?  No, I bet you don't.  Sure, he's gone after you and yours, as demons do, and you paid him by tryin' to turn him human.  You know it, if you think.  Hell has spent centuries tryin' to crush out the last bit of humanity in him and you've seen some of that, in what he's done."  The older hunter's stare went to Sam.  "What you did changed him and more – I think _he_ changed him.  Was there ever a demon that tried to make up for his evil?  Not in any lore I've read.  And now....there's mutters and smart remarks because he's with me.  And you will not disrespect me.  I hear any more shit about Crowley, to his face or behind his back, and I'll show you I can still beat the shit out of either of you.  And if none of that gets through, you're in his house.  Learn some manners."

Neither brother said a word, but their eyes were widened.

"Crowley, I reckon we should take them back topside, drop 'em at the bunker and let them take care of themselves."  Bobby grinned.  "You and me can head to that cabin I told you about, and ride out some of this chaos.  Figure out what sort of world we're in now."

"That sounds like a plan, Robert."  Crowley stood, gave the Winchesters a cool stare.  "The sooner they're out of my place, the happier I'll be.  Do you want to give Sheriff Mills a heads-up?"

"Why Jody?"  Sam asked misguidedly.

"Think you'll find she's in charge of your bunker these days,"  Bobby advised, taking out his phone and dialling.  "Jody?  Yeah, it's me – well, long story.  So long as all of you are all right.  Yeah.  We're on our way back."

 

EPILOGUE

 

There was a log cabin in a winter forest, a long way from the chaos which the world had become, though its occupants had their fair share of encounters with the wandering creatures sprung back into the world when Purgatory's gates were open.  There was some back and forth communication between the cabin's occupants and those of the place called the Bunker, where a larger group lived and did their best to help with the restoration of the little town nearby.

Bobby Singer liked his own space, especially now that a few raids had gathered in various books, the nucleus of his new library of lore.  After all, he couldn't always be depending on the books in the Men of Letters bunker, though Jody Mills assured him he could borrow anything anytime.  He was also still defensive on the part of his sometime housemate, the King of Hell, who still wasn't as welcomed as Bobby was by most of the bunker's people.

There were a couple of exceptions, of course.  Margaret, matriarch of all she surveyed, adored Crowley and was willing to back him against anybody.  And Benny Lafitte had been heard to tell Dean he ought to be more forgiving of somebody who had done so much for him, against his demon nature and all.  Things like that do take time and as Bobby often reminded Crowley, they were dealing with idjits.

 

THE END

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I know there are loose ends here, but I do plan more in this universe. Hopefully people will be interested!


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